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Surprise! Screaming babies on planes isn’t your top annoyance, says survey

July 10, 2009

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What could be worse that screaming babies on a plane? Screaming babies in a movie theater, according to a new survey by Baby Orajel teething pain medicine.

Asked in which of the following situations would you least like to encounter a crying baby, a majority — 56 percent — answered “movie theater.”  About a quarter (22 percent) said on a plane, with the balance going to a religious function (12 percent) and restaurant (10 percent).


Among some of the other noteworthy findings:

• Crying babies aren’t nearly as annoying as other loud noises you may encounter during the day. The survey showed that the most frustrating sounds to hear (in order) are: a car alarm (39 percent), jackhammer (28 percent), baby crying (21 percent) and a barking dog (13 percent).

• Parents, who are more accustomed to the sound of cranky infants, are less likely than those without children to get annoyed by the sound of a crying baby. Specifically, 25 percent of non-parents named a baby crying as the most frustrating sound to hear, while only 15 percent of parents stated that in the survey.

I asked the folks at Orajel if they had any thoughts on the low number for planes, which is a favorite topic of this blog’s readers. A spokeswoman had this to say:

Hope you understand that I’m really not at liberty to make a comment about the survey — now, we don’t want to get me in trouble, right?

Of course.

Christopher Elliott is the author of Scammed: How to Save Your Money and Find Better Service in a World of Schemes, Swindles, and Shady Deals. Critics have called it “eye-opening” and “inspiring” — it’ll “grab your attention and won’t let go.” Order your copy now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble or iTunes.

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12 comments

  • deborah

    At least in a theatre one has the choice to walk out. Can’t really do that on a plane! And if you polled actual plane travellers only, I think the survey would have different results.

    Was on 4 segments this last weekend, and I SWEAR had a baby or kid behind us on each one. The loudest toddler fell asleep after take off, but before that was proclaiming I DONT WANT TO VISIT GRANDMA. Seriously, over and over. But we made it back safely, which above all the goal.

  • http://www.letouquet-gite.com/ Richy1

    No has to be grumpy air crew for me the babies i can handle.

  • Charlie

    Makes sense – in a theater, I’ve paid for a particular audio/video experience, so the baby is directly interfering with what I’ve (over)paid for. (Same with all the ringing cell phones and folks who keep yapping during the show.) Plus there’s the annoyance of knowing that the baby is there only because the parents wouldn’t or couldn’t get a babysitter, and many of said parents don’t know when to take baby out to the lobby.

    On a plane, the baby has just as much reason to be there (transportation) and the audio environment is not part of the Contract of Carriage! ;-)

  • Grizz

    Take that one more step and imagine what it’d sound like if cell phones were allowed to be used inflight.
    YEESH!

  • Dave

    I would agree with the majority of this survey. In an airplane, a crying baby usually isn’t interupting anything. In a movie theater, a crying baby is drawing your attention away from the experience you paid for and hope to enjoy.

  • HMVincent

    I was 7 or 8 years old, in the early ’60s, when our family went out of our small town to another small town to see a Disney nature movie (I can remember only snow, rivers, and otters). I had a tantrum. My mother pulled me out of the theater to the street, and spanked me good. These days, you can’t do that. I’ll bet the rest of the audience was glad it wasn’t these days.

  • Jennifer (the other one)

    It’s possible for a situation to arise where parents have no choice but to fly with their baby. However, I can’t think of any reason why parents would NEED to bring their baby to a movie theater, restaurant, etc. That probably factored into the survey responses.

  • http://www.meetingscollaborative.com Joan Eisenstodt

    I’m with Grizz — if cell phones are allowed on planes, I’m riding on the wing.
    And screaming babies – and more, the parents who do nothing – are annoying on planes, at the movies, in restaurants, anywhere. For all but planes, an adult can take the child with them out of the situation. Even noise-canceling head-phones don’t keep out the screaming.

  • Kevin M

    I think one reason people are a little more understanding about kids on planes is that even adults experience the pressure changes, the ear popping, the noise of the engines, etc. Those things affect babies a lot more than us (they don’t know what to make of the noise and all the know about the pressure changes is that their ears hurt). And as some have commented, sometimes parents HAVE to travel with their kids.

    They don’t HAVE to go to a theater with the kids, though.

  • Wm Hope

    I really think I must be from some other planet. I can ignore babies with the best of them, even though my wife and I have no children and, no, I’m not a pediatrician, child psychologist, teacher in preschool, etc. If the baby is actually near me, it’s a lot more fun to try to see if I can distract/amuse it and get it to settle down. It’s like an adventure and a lot more interesting than the alleged entertainment the airlines try to sell you a headset for. Since our ability to remember early childhood is so limited, I suppose it’s pointless to suggest complaining passengers try to remember what it was like, but they could at least try to stretch their minds far enough to concentrate on something else, or imagine themselves in something like the baby’s position.

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