Correlates of Foster Mother-Infant Bonding

描述（由申请人提供）：本研究的第一个目的是研究寄养母亲在与寄养婴儿建立关系的前三个月里，其承诺报告的变化，以及寄养母亲与寄养婴儿建立关系的神经生物学、心理生理学和行为相关关系。第二个目的是确定在养母之间的联系的个体差异的预测因素。拟议的研究项目集成了多种技术来实现这些目标。生物学测量将包括养母产生的催产素，一种与纽带形成相关的激素，以及养母在看到养母婴儿的图像时表现出的“动机性注意”（通过事件相关电位测量）。寄养母亲的承诺是通过半结构化的访谈来衡量的，包括关于寄养母亲对他们所照顾的婴儿的感受的问题。行为测量包括养母在玩耍中对婴儿表现出的快乐程度。这些因素将在安置的头几周以及婴儿与养母一起生活三个月后对每个养母进行评估。本研究的结果将扩大对异体亲代关系如何形成的理解，有助于识别可能难以形成对寄养婴儿承诺关系的寄养母亲，并有助于制定旨在促进高质量寄养母亲-婴儿关系的干预计划。由于该研究将增加对与养父母-婴儿关系形成和寄养婴儿发展相关的保护性和风险因素的理解，因此该研究与治疗寄养婴儿或参与寄养婴儿安置决策的各个领域的专业人员高度相关。这项研究也与公共卫生领域有很高的相关性，因为它将有助于努力降低寄养婴儿的发展和社会情感问题的风险，这些问题与儿童后期和青春期的药物滥用问题、外化和内化障碍有关。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The first aim of the proposed research study is to examine changes in foster mothers' reports of commitment, and neurobiological, psychophysiological, and behavioral correlates of bond formation among foster mothers across the first three months of the relationship with their foster infants. The second aim is to identify predictors of individual differences in the bonding among foster mothers. The proposed research project integrates multiple techniques to achieve these goals. Biological measurements will include the foster mothers' production of oxytocin, a hormone associated with bond formation, and the foster mothers' "motivated attention" (measured through event related potentials) exhibited in response to images of their foster infant. Foster mothers' commitment is measured through a semi-structured interview that includes questions regarding the foster mothers' feelings toward the infant in their care. Behavioral measures include the amount of delight that the foster mothers exhibit toward their infants in play. These factors will be assessed in each foster mother during the first weeks of placement and after the infant has lived with the foster mother for three months. Results from this study would broaden the understanding of how alloparental bonds form, assist in the identification of foster mothers who may have difficulty forming committed bonds to foster infants, and be useful in the development of intervention programs aimed at promoting high-quality foster mother-infant bonds. Because the research will increase the understanding of protective and risk factors related to foster parentinfant bond formation and foster infant development, such research is highly relevant to professionals in a variety of fields who treat infants in foster care or who are involved in foster infant placement decisions. This research study also has high relevance for the field of public health as it would contribute to efforts to reduce the risk of foster infants' developmental and social-emotional problems, which are associated with substance abuse problems, externalizing, and internalizing disorders later in later childhood and adolescence.