POSTPARTUM DEPRESSION: RISK FACTOR FOR INFANTS

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Research has demonstrated that from 12% to 20% of postpartum women develop a clinically significant depressive reaction more prolonged than the "blues" and serious enough to interfere with daily functioning, including mothering. Studies indicate as well that insensitive and unresponsive mothering in early infancy is associated with impairments in social, cognitive, and motivational development. A troubled, withdrawn woman would be expected to be less available to meet her infant needs suggesting that maternal depression may be a potentially significant risk factor and early infancy a time of particular vulnerability. However, the effects of postpartum depression on the infant and the infant-mother relationship remain to be examined systematically. This seems an important issue to explore since it has obvious implications for both primary prevention and early intervention. In the proposed study, a group of 50 middle-class, married, primiparous mothers who meet modified Research Diagnostic Criteria for depression will be identified and matched with 50 non-depressed postpartum women. Women will be observed interacting with their infants during feeding and face-to-face interactions at 8, 16, and 24 weeks. The course, severity, and duration of maternal depression will be monitored with interview and self-report measures. Further the severity and duration of maternal symptomatology will be examined in relation to maternal perceptions and objective measures of infant behavior. Finally, infant coping will be assessed with convergent measures which examine engagement with the social and non-social environment. It is expected that depressed women and their infants will be less positive and less responsive in their interactions and less reciprocal in their social communications that non-depressed mother-infant dyads. Infants of depressed women also are expected to show less ability to engage their mothers and less involvement with environmental challenges. A goal of this study is to determine whether postpartum depression is a factor placing young infants at developmental risk. If so, the next goal of this research program will be the development of appropriate prevention strategies focussed both on the women themselves and on their relationship with their infants.