A longitudinal study of mothers' emotional responses to crying infants under 12 months of age

Abstract

Purpose
This study was undertaken to investigate the emotional responses of mothers to the crying of their 1-to-12-month old infants.
Methods
Survey 1: During a public well-baby checkup for one-month olds, a survey using a self-entry questionnaire was given to 763 mothers, for the purpose of analyzing the emotional responses of mothers to their crying infants. The questionnaire contained 20 questions to gain information about accepting and non-accepting reactions of mothers when they hear the cries of their infants.
Survey 2: When the infants reached age 4-5 months, a similar self-entry questionnaire survey was given to 429 mothers who had consented to participate in this longitudinal study during Survey 1.
Survey 3: When the infants reached age 12 months, a similar self-entry questionnaire survey was given to 305 mothers who had consented to participate in this longitudinal study during Survey 2.
Results
An analysis was made of the responses of the mothers who had participated in all three surveys made during the first 12 months after the births of their infants. Of these mothers, 124 (49.0%) were primiparous (49.0%) and 127 (51.0%) were multiparous.
At 1 month after birth, the accepting emotional scores of the mothers averaged 30.6±5.3 (range: 10-40) and their non-accepting emotional scores averaged 18.0±6.3 (range: 10-40). At 4-5 months after birth, the accepting scores averaged 29.8±5.9 and the non-accepting scores averaged 17.6±5.8. At 12 months, the scores were 28.2±5.8 and 18.9±6.1, respectively. Thus, accepting emotional score tended to be high throughout the first 12 months after birth, reaching a peak at 1 month after birth and decreasing significantly over time (p<0.05-0.0001). The non-accepting emotional score was higher at 12 months than at the other points of time after birth (p<0.05-0.0001). At 1 month, the accepting emotional score was higher among multiparas than among primiparas (p<0.05), while the non-accepting emotional score was significantly higher among primiparas than among multiparas (p<0.01). These differences in emotional score depending on previous experiences of parenting were specific to one month after birth and were not carried through to the later periods.
Conclusion
In a longitudinal survey of 251 mothers, acceptance of crying was high among mothers of one-month-olds, but it decreased gradually over time. At 12 months after birth, non-acceptance predominated over acceptance (a reversal of the earlier relationship between acceptance and non-acceptance).