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I found an interesting article online that describes the pitch range of ordinary infant versus distressed ‘sick’ infant crying:
Impact of the Cry of the Infant at Risk on Psychosocial Development
PHILIP SANFORD ZESKIND, PhD
Carolinas Medical Center, USA
(Published online April 4, 2005)
Recent Research Results
“Whereas research originally sought to find whether cries elicited by discrete eliciting conditions could be perceptually differentiated, (4,25) more recent research has centered on cries as representing a continuum of sounds. (26,17) A model emphasizing a “synchrony of arousal” between infants and caregivers describes how increases or decreases in infant arousal produce corresponding changes in the temporal and acoustic characteristics of infant crying that then typically produce corresponding increases or decreases in the perceived arousal and motivation of the caregiver. (27) For example, as the infant becomes increasingly hungry and aroused, cries become increasingly higher-pitched, resulting in increasingly higher-perceived arousal in the caregiver. In this way, the cry sound mediates a symbiosis between the conditions that result in infant crying and the caregiver’s responses to the infant.” [please see the references noted by numbers embedded within this text by clicking on the title of the article above]
“Whereas typical cries may range in fundamental frequency (basic pitch) from 400 to 650 Hz, hyperphonated cries are defined by a qualitative break in the cry sound to a fundamental frequency above 1,000 Hz that may range to 2,000 Hz and more.”
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I wanted to get an idea about what this range of crying pitch might sound like, so I found a list of the hertz range for notes on a piano keyboard.
The sound range of the crying of a ‘sick’ baby is way up there on the piano keyboard, at and above ‘soprano C’.
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“Reflecting a special condition of infant arousal, the high-pitched hyperphonated cry of the infant at risk elicits significantly stronger perceptual and physiological reactions than typical infant cries. Across cultures, (14,28) hyperphonated cries are perceived to be more irritating, aversive, arousing and “sick” sounding than typical cries and to elicit more immediate responses that include holding and cuddling. (29) Several studies indicate that there are at least two distinct dimensions underlying the perceptions of hyperphonated cries ― one in which the infant sounds “sick” and requires ameliorative care and one in which the cry is perceived as unusually aversive. (14,30) A higher cry pitch has been directly related to these particular perceptions. (30)”
“The presence of at least two dimensions underlying the perceptions of infant cry sounds underscores the importance of considering how the same cry sound may have different meanings to caregivers, depending on the listener’s emotional set.”
“In contrast to the typical response of increased arousal to higher-pitched cry sounds, adolescent mothers, (34) women suffering from depression35 and women who use cocaine during pregnancy (36) perceive cries of increasing pitch as being less arousing and less worthy of immediate care.”
“These differences in caregiver responsivity to infants with higher-pitched and hyperphonated cry sounds have been shown to be related to the infant’s subsequent psychosocial development.”
Conclusion
“The psychosocial development pathway of the infant at risk will reflect the combined effects of the infant’s altered neurobehavioural organization, the resulting behavioural repertoire of the infant, and how individual caregivers respond to the infant. As part of this behavioural repertoire, the hyperphonated cry of the infant at risk is a two-edged sword. So aversive are the physical properties of high-pitched infant crying that caregivers will often try to do whatever is necessary to try to stop the noxious sound. In most cases, these attempts will provide the kinds of auditory, visual, vestibular and tactile-kinesthetic forms of stimulation that promote infant development. This process may be accentuated when caregivers respond with attentive, more immediate ameliorative care to an infant they think sounds “sick.”
“In some cases, however, caregivers may respond to the aversive quality of the cry with unusually heightened arousal that provides that basis for “defensive” reactions, actions that are physically detrimental to the infant’s well-being and/or emotional and physical withdrawal of the mother from the infant over time. When a mother suffers from depression, for example, her emotional condition may make her even less able to respond to the crying infant as the needs of that infant increase. In extreme cases, her response patterns may include an increased risk for physical child abuse and/or neglect. These divergent response patterns and [have] effects on several aspects of the infant’s psychosocial development have been supported in longitudinal studies.”
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What happens to an infant’s development when the mother/caregiver, who is supposed to be the infant’s comforter is, instead the SOURCE of an infant’s distress and hence of its higher pitched cry of distress?
Reading this information makes me wonder about my own stress response and aversion to high pitched sounds. I have almost NO tolerance for them at all!! They are a trigger for my trauma that is often hard to understand — but maybe the facts that this article points out are part of the much bigger SOUND picture — including verbal abuse — that set our nervous system off down the trauma-changed road from the beginning of my life.
This — a “synchrony of arousal” between infants and caregiver — does not happen for battered babies and hence our development is trauma-changed.
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Stop the Storm 