Mothers' Working Models of Caregiving in the Context of Infant Feeding: Change through the First Year.

N

22

National Inst. of Nursing Research (NIH), Bethesda, MD.

Adjustment (to Environment); Comparative Analysis; Depression (Psychology); Infants; Longitudinal Studies; Models; Mothers; Parent Attitudes; Parent Background; Parent Child Relationship; Personality

This study examined the change in mothers' working models of infant feeding through the first post-term year of full-term infants and of prematurely born infants with a history of lung disease. It also examined the contribution of maternal resources such as education and mental well-being and infant attributes (maturity at birth and lung disease in the neonatal period, birth weight, weight-for-age z-score, and amenability) to changes in working models. The sample was comprised of 38 mothers of premature infants and 52 mothers of full-term infants. At 1, 4, 8, and 12 months post-term age, assessments were made of the adaptiveness of the mothers' working models of feeding via a video-assisted interview, the mother's symptoms of depression, the infant's weight-for-age z-score, and the infant's amenability. Analysis showed change in adaptiveness of the working model of feeding with time. The change was not linear; the highest adaptiveness scores were at 4 months and the lowest at 8. Only a mother's education and symptoms of depression had a significant effect on adaptiveness--education at 1, 8, and 12 months and symptoms of depression at 8 months. Findings suggested directions for nursing intervention. (Three tables delineate findings. Contains 14 references and 3 tables.) (Author/KDFB)

1997

ED407160