Observations of interactions of depressed women with their children

Abstract

Dysfunctional interactions between mothers with major affective disorders and their children may contribute to the children's high risk of disorder. This study investigated the behavior of mothers with recurrent unipolar depression, bipolar disorder, or chronic medical illness and of normal subjects toward their children during a directly observed conflict discussion task. In addition, lifetime history of depression, current mood, and chronic stress were investigated as predictors of maternal interaction. Unipolar depressed women displayed relatively more negative, less positive, and less task-focused behaviour toward their children. Current mood and chronic stress, more than psychiatric history, contributed to the prediction of interaction style.

Major depressive disorder in a Kenyan youth sample: relationship with parenting behavior and parental psychiatric disorders

“…This is more so because rejecting maternal parenting behavior is relatively more common in our society [45]; therefore, it may be important to educate the public about these abnormal parenting styles that are associated with an increased risk of offspring to develop psychopathology. This data is consistent with previous research findings which have indicated that parental psychopathology is associated with maladaptive parental behavior [11,29-32] which is also associated with increased risk of the children to develop psychopathology. Perceived rejecting maternal parental behavior was the only independent variable, where higher scores on the rejecting-ineffective parenting scale were associated with higher odds of MDD among the youth.…”

Activation During Observed Parent–Child Interactions with Anxious Youths: A Pilot Study

“…Conflict Conversation (5 min) The Conflict Task was modeled on the task used by several research groups (e.g., Gordon et al 1989; Moore et al 2004; Siqueland et al 1996; Whaley et al 1999). Prior to collection of behavioral and physiology data, parents and children were asked independently to generate lists of conflict topics for the conflict task.…”

Impact of maternal depressive symptoms on the development of infant temperament: Cascading effects during the first year of life

“…For instance, whereas high parental sensitivity, that is, the ability to promptly respond to and correctly interpret the child's cues (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978), facilitates the development of the child's ability to control NA (Kopp, 1989), a more intrusive parenting style may lead to an increased level of NA (Belsky, Putnam, & Crnic, 1996). Further, mothers experiencing DS develop altered and potentially problematic patterns of interaction with their infant, resulting in a suboptimal parenting style (e.g., Cummings & Davies, 1994;Field, Healy, Goldstein, & Guthertz, 1990;Gordon et al, 1989;Tronick, 1989).…”