Some newborn infants show fixed rotation and tilting of the head to one side. Most of the cases of congenital torticollis are result from injury to the sterno-cleidomastoid muscle due to birth trauma caused by over streching of this muscle during a difficult delivery.
However, congenital torticollis has been found to be present in infants delivered by cesarean section.This fact indicates that, at least in some cases, the congenital torticollis may be caused by genetic factors or environmental factors, or by multifactorial inheritance.