Maternal sensitivity in rural Andean and Amazonian Peru

Abstract

In the current study, we observed 12 mothers with a 4-21-month-old infant during their daily activities for around 3 h per dyad, focusing on daily caregiving practices such as feeding, bathing, and soothing in the rural multiple-caregiver cultural contexts of the Andean and Amazonian parts of Peru. Overall, sensitivity levels were high, with an average of 7.33 (out of 9), and 7 out of the 12 mothers scoring in the high range (scores 7-9), and the remaining 5 in the good-enough range (scores 5-6). In-depth descriptions of mother-infant interactions show that these high sensitivity levels reflect mothers' ability to multitask, combining household and agricultural chores with high sensitive responsiveness to their infants' signals. The presence of multiple caregivers seemed to allow mothers to make sure the infants were well attended when they were temporarily unavailable but combined with quick renewed availability if the infant seemed to need maternal proximity.

Strategies and behaviors used by mothers in interactions with their young children during a mealtime in peri-urban areas of Huánuco, Peru

“…These findings expand on past evidence of facilitation from a study by Lebron et al [23] with Hispanic families living in the USA who found that, when introducing new foods or foods that the child did not like, caregivers often chose to hide disliked/new foods or improve the taste with other foods so that the child would accept them. They also extend the findings of another study conducted in a rural area in Peru which identified sensitive caring behaviors in mothers when caring for her infant [24] by revealing the use of responsive feeding behaviors in Peruvian mothers.…”

Has maternal sensitivity been comprehensively investigated in sub-Saharan Africa? A narrative scoping review

“…Also of concern is that to date, in sharp contrast to reported work in the (Deans, 2018) systematic literature review, an extremely limited set of risks (social support, maternal frightening behaviours, maternal iron deficiency, postpartum depression, individualistic western contexts. Research from other LMICs suggests this may constitute a resilience factor (Fourment et al, 2018) and warrants more attention in African studies in the progress towards decolonising psychology on the continent. This reality is key to building a knowledge base that is representative of the varied parenting context in Sub-Saharan Africa.…”

“…Importantly, they were able to work in collaboration with a local psychiatrist well versed in mother-infant relations. More recently, Mesman has worked in close collaboration with local researchers in various contexts to address the need for nuanced knowledge of maternal sensitive behaviours (Alsarhi et al, 2018;Asanjarani et al, 2018;Dawson et al, 2018;Fourment et al, 2018;Fourment et al, 2018;Mesman, Basweti, et al, 2018;Ribeiro-Accioly et al, 2018;Mesman et al, 2021;Pitillas et al, 2021). Sensitivity measures, such as the MBQS mini which set relatively rigid definitions for sensitive responding appropriate for WEIRD countries, are being challenged (Dawson et al, 2018(Dawson et al, , 2021Mesman, Basweti, et al, 2018;Mesman et al, 2021).…”

Maternal sensitivity and warmth in Singapore: Cultural insights from comparing the Ainsworth and Emotional Availability Scales

“…Mean Ainsworth sensitivity score was low (4.38), which roughly corresponds to a qualitative description of being "quite insensitive". Elsewhere, studies that have used the Ainsworth sensitivity scale have reported much higher means -5.47 for mothers with preschoolers in Indonesia (Rahma et al, 2018) and 7.33 for mothers with children from 4 to 21 months old in Peru (M = 7.33; Fourment et al, 2018).…”