Abstract
<p>Infant sleep is a relational, caregiving experience, yet parents encounter advice about it that varies in how well it fits the way they already care for their infant. How parents engage with this advice may relate to how well it aligns with their usual parenting approach, but this has not been examined. This exploratory study characterised parents' experiences of infant sleep advice from health professionals and other sources and examined whether alignment of advice with parents' usual parenting approach was associated with its use and with satisfaction. An online sample of 201 Western Australian parents (98% female) of an infant aged 0–3 years (mean infant age 16.25 months) rated, for each type of advice received and separately by source, its alignment with their usual way of parenting, whether they had used it, and their satisfaction with outcomes. Complete responsiveness was rated most aligned and used most often; extinction-based approaches least aligned. Health professionals more often provided extinction-based advice and other sources complete responsiveness; 43.5% of parents who received health-professional advice had not sought it. Greater alignment was associated with greater advice use (OR = 3.66 per one point increase in alignment) and higher satisfaction (B = 0.69), more so than type of advice or its source. Results suggest parents' engagement with advice reflects how well it fits their existing parenting approach. Supporting families well may therefore require a broader range of acceptable, relational approaches, attuned to the caregiving relationship rather than to infant behaviour alone.</p>