Parents
Thanks for taking an interest in Baby Loves Science. Baby Loves Science lets you learn about your child while contributing to science!
You have a chance to receive individual feedback on a survey that has been designed by university scientists from around the world. Surveys are about topics ranging from joking to learning styles. When enough parents fill out surveys, we will also show you your child’s strengths - perhaps pretending, or understanding language. With the help of parents like yourself, we will use this information to unlock secrets of how young children develop, and we will tell you what we find.
Baby Loves Science has other features too. You can track your child’s milestones (e.g., first steps, first word) , track your child’s growth, and upload photos of your child. All the information (surveys, milestones, growth, photos) will feed into your own personal Baby Book that you can download as a PDF and share with friends and family.
Who Can Participate?
Our surveys are generally designed for children from birth to 4 years. You can sign up and see if there is a survey that is the right age for your child. Even if there isn’t right now, we can contact you when there is one (if you want to be contacted).
We want to hear about the development of all types of children. If your child has a developmental disorder, just let us know what your child’s developmental disorder is when you register - you will get to fill out all the surveys just like everyone else! If enough parents of children with a specific developmental disorder fill out the same survey, that will give us a chance to learn about development specific to that group, and we will be able to feed that information back to you through the blog.
We are very interested in finding out about children from different language backgrounds and cultures. Just let us know which language(s) your child understands/is exposed to when you register - you will get to fill out all the surveys just like everyone else! If enough parents from a specific language background or culture fill out the same survey, that will give us a chance to learn about development specific to that group, and we will be able to feed that information back to you through the blog.
About the Surveys
The current focus of Baby Loves Science is to figure out how humour, pretending, and deception develop in young children. However these are only some of the surveys that will be on offer. So on any month the survey can be about all sorts of things! The surveys range from 5-30 minutes.
You can do as many or as few surveys as you like. It’s up to you, and since it’s anonymous, we won’t know what you choose to do. But remember that the more surveys you fill out, the more chances you get to learn about your child’s development and your child’s strengths. It would also help us a lot. For instance, if lots of people fill out our humour survey, we can tell parents about humour in young children. But more interesting questions can be answered if lots of parents fill out multiple surveys, e.g., language and humour. Then we can find out if these two types of development are linked!
What Happens with my Information?
Scientists at universities will receive your anonymous survey answers, anonymous information about milestones, and anonymous registration information. Researchers will not know you or your child’s names, contact details, or dates of birth, and will not have access to your photos. Researchers will then use the anonymous surveys to better understand how young children develop as a group. They will share their findings with you through the blog. They will also submit papers to academic journals. When a paper is published with your data, it will show up in the “Your Publications” section (which will appear when we have our first publication). Please note that if you include personal information in an anecdote on a survey (e.g., “Mary likes to play with cars”), then the researchers will have that information, but will not reveal that information to others. For instance, if they share that anecdote, they will delete or replace your child’s name.
We have put in lots of safeguards to keep your information safe. First, the website is encrypted. Second, we require you to create a password that is difficult to crack. Third, we recommend that you keep your security software up to date. See our security page for more information.
How Much does it Cost?
This service is free! We are trying to discover how young children develop and so we are thankful for your time.