The Architecture of Cosleeping among Wage‐Earning and Subsistence Farming Cameroonian Nso Families

Abstract

This article addresses early caregiving environments, specifically cosleeping patterns among wage‐earning and subsistence farming—based Cameroonian Nso families and their children during the first year of life. Forty‐three wage‐earning and 35 farming Nso mothers were interviewed at home about their formal schooling, economic activities, living conditions, children's sleeping arrangements, and night care. The findings provide ethnographic evidence that the Nso have a cosleeping culture, and that wage earning is an index of social and cultural change and exerts a substantial influence on sleeping patterns. The traditional pattern in the farming family is that mothers share the bed only with the infant, engage in no bedtime routines or schedules, and plan to wean their children later than do mothers in wage‐earning families. The wage‐earning mothers share a bed with an infant and others, predominantly the father. They also have bedtime routines and schedules and plan to wean their children approximately five months earlier than do mothers in farming families. The results are discussed with respect to the Nso culture and sociohistorical changes related to changes in economic livelihood and urbanization.