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How do I know when to follow the data and when to go with my gut?
This may be the most popular question I get when talking to parents. People want to make data-driven decisions, but they also want to trust their instincts. There is an inherent sense that these approaches may be in conflict, and you have to choose one or the other.
My answer: I reject this premise. Data isn’t bossy, but your gut shouldn’t be either.
In parenting choices, it’s almost never the case that the data alone provides a clear answer. Yes, there are a few exceptions — like using a car seat with a newborn, for example — but these apply only to a small fraction of our hardest parenting choices. Similarly, our gut feelings should not exist in a vacuum. Rarely should we go with our gut feeling without considering the alternatives.
Good decision-making requires both our gut and data, and it also relies on our constraints. The question isn’t which one to use; it’s how to combine them.
What does your gut actually tell you?
What do we mean when we say we have a “gut feeling”? Often, this is just another way to express our preferences.
Let’s take child care as a classic example. You may have a choice between day care, a nanny, or some other child care arrangement. Saying “my gut feeling is that day care is right for us” is just another way to say “I would prefer to have my child in day care.” The phrase “gut feeling” or “instinct” makes this seem like some kind of special, deeply rooted value, but it’s not fundamentally any different than a preference that you’d have about your job or what to eat for lunch.
This framing is important in decision-making because while “gut feelings” can seem bossy, “preferences” are a lot more neutral. By recognizing you are just expressing a preference — maybe a strong one, but it’s still only a preference — you allow the possibility that some information might influence you to override this preference. In the child care example, even if you prefer a specific day care, if there is a long waitlist or higher-than-anticipated costs, you may be open to alternatives.
If you aren’t sure what your preferences actually are, when faced with multiple choices, think ultimately about what you want your life to look like. Sometimes, this can be hard when you’re dealing with anxiety or overwhelmed by other people’s opinions. To start, imagine the version of your life when you have made each choice; how do you feel about them? How do these choices align with other preferences that you feel clearer about?
What does data actually tell you?
Data, from research studies and other sources, can tell us the risks and benefits of particular choices.
For example, consider the decision of whether to circumcise a baby boy. The data can tell us the possible risks, how likely they are, the possible benefits, and how large they are. The key thing here is to find trustworthy data from reliable sources that you can feel confident in.
Studies can also show us what works. There is research that clues us into how to address picky eating more effectively and what discipline strategies most consistently lead to behavior change.
But data cannot tell you what to do. I’ll repeat: data isn’t bossy! The research can’t tell you if you should circumcise your son or not; how could it? The data doesn’t know your religion, your cultural context, or how you feel about this choice. It can’t weigh all the factors that matter to your family.
Data is an input — an important one — but it’s not the only one.
Understanding your constraints
Not all options are possible, and we are all constrained in various ways. These may be financial constraints, or they may be practical ones.
Thinking again about child care, having one parent stay home may not be a financial option for all families. You may be constrained in time; there may be a child care center you love, but it’s very far away, and it’s difficult or impossible to get there every day (or you may not want to drive that much).
There are social constraints as well as individual ones. Your preference may be to take a year of paid parental leave, but if you live in the U.S., that is not likely to be feasible.
Understanding the constraints we face, and then doing the best we can within those, is the core of good economic decision-making.
How do we make good decisions?
Making good decisions requires combining our gut (“preferences”) with the data.
These decisions begin with our constraints, which dictate what we are really choosing between. Too often, we come into our decision-making without an understanding of our choices. We ask questions like: “Should I send my child to day care or not?” This is a poorly formed question, since “or not” is not a child care solution. To make a good decision, you need to be clear on the (limited number of) choices that are realistic.
Once you’ve got a concrete question, with choices guided by your constraints, it’s then possible to combine data and preferences to make a final decision.
What might this look like in practice? Let’s imagine the choice you are making is about whether to sleep train your 7-month-old, or not.
- What are the options? The main sleep train option is to use a cry-it-out method with the aim of improving nighttime sleep. Depending on your situation, the alternative choice may vary. Maybe the alternative is two short wake-ups to eat overnight. Maybe the alternative is your baby is getting up every hour to eat. Maybe the alternative option is to co-sleep. Ask yourself: if we do not choose to sleep train, what will we do instead? What we are currently doing, or something new?
- What are your preferences? People feel differently about waking up at night — it affects them differently — and they feel differently about the idea of cry-it-out. This isn’t a value judgement in any direction, it’s just true. Sleep training is a reasonable option, but it may not be for you. Or it might be! This is the place to ask about your preferences, your partner’s preferences if you have one, and how they interact with your options and the data.
- What does the data say? In this case, you can read much more about the data here. This “what does the data say” is what I always want you to come to ParentData for. That’s my job! In this case, the data says that sleep training improves infant sleep, on average, generally improves parent sleep, and doesn’t lead to long-term attachment or other problems. The data also says it’s not a perfect solution for everyone and works better for some babies than others.
- What are your constraints? What is possible in your situation? Does your baby share a room with an older child (which may make sleep training more complex)? Are both parents working outside the home, which may make the need for sleep greater? These kinds of constraints may make sleep training more or less possible.
Ultimately, a decision should come out of this that respects the data, but also involves your preferences (and your partner’s). Just because sleep training doesn’t ruin your baby’s attachment to you doesn’t mean you should do it; it may not be for you. The data doesn’t boss you in one direction or the other; it just provides grounding.
I argue we should take a similar approach to many of our challenging parenting decisions — circumcision, breastfeeding, or choices about childbirth. If you are considering trying for a vaginal birth after a cesarean section, this decision should involve the data on risks (for you in particular) and also your preferences for what kind of birth you want.
I wish I could tell you how to combine these perfectly, but there is no secret sauce. To make a good decision, you’ve got to put everything on the table, engage with disagreements if you’re making choices with another person, and ultimately decide. The frustrating thing: you’ll never know if this was the right decision. With these hard choices, we are always going to live with the uncertainty about what could have been. What you can do is know you made the decision in the best way possible.
Closing thoughts
As parents, especially parents who love data, I think we are often looking for data to tell us what to do. Secretly, we do want the data to be bossy sometimes. It can feel easier to defend our choices if they are “what the data says.” Looking at our own preferences can be scary, confusing, and fraught, especially when they conflict with those of others. Panic headlines can make this worse by implying that some choices are bad, even when that generally isn’t true.
In the end, though, there is no substitute for thinking. There is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to life or parenting. Good decision-making is work, and it can be messy. But the good news is that it’s work you do once, and on the other side, the benefit is confidence in our choices and a better ability to ignore when other people question them.
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Thank you for verbalizing this in a way that helps with people like me crippled by decision fatigue and data overload, very helpful!
I don’t care what another parent chooses re circumcision, or breastfeeding, or sleep training. Their kids will be fine, either way. I will be fine either way.
But I DO care a whole lot about their choices on vaccination. They affect me and my kids. You could look at the data and say, there are benefits and risks, so I’ll go with my gut. But this ignores A) that the information environment has been twisted and B) that your choice could kill someone else. In that scenario, maybe data aren’t bossy, but policy definitely should be.
Thank you, well said!
So many great points in this article. Sometimes the overwhelming nature of parenting does make you wish the data or that elusive “someone” would tell you what the right answer is. Feeling that we’ve had a solid methodology for making that decision does help!