ABSTRACT
Growth modeling was used to examine the developmental trajectory of infant temperamental fear with maternal fear and depressive symptoms as predictors of infant fearfulness and change in infant fear predicting toddler anxiety symptoms. In Study 1, a sample of 158 mothers reported their own depressive symptoms and fear when their children were 4 months of age and infant fearfulness at 4, 6, 8, 10, and 12 months. Maternal symptoms of depression predicted steeper increases in infant fearfulness over time (z = 2.06, p < .05), with high initial infant fear and steeper increases in fear (intercept, z = 2.32, p < .05, and slope, z = 1.88, p < .05) predicting more severe toddler anxiety symptoms. In Study 2, an independent sample of 134 mothers completed measures of maternal depression and fear when the infants were 4 months old, and standardized laboratory observations of infant fear were made at 8, 10, and 12 months. Consistent with Study 1, maternal depression accounted for change in fearfulness (z = 2.30, p < .05), with more frequent and more severe maternal symptoms leading to greater increases in infant fear and increases in fearfulness z = 2.08, p < .05) leading to more problematic toddler anxiety. The implications and contributions of these findings are discussed in terms of methodology, fear development, and developmental psychopathology.
Subject(s)
Anxiety/psychology , Fear/psychology , Maternal Behavior/psychology , Mothers/psychology , Temperament , Adult , Child Development , Child, Preschool , Depression/psychology , Female , Humans , Infant , Infant Behavior/psychology , Male , Middle Aged , Mother-Child Relations , Personality Assessment , Stress, Psychological/psychology , Surveys and QuestionnairesABSTRACT
In the current study, latent growth modeling (LGM) was used to: (1) identify the developmental trajectories of infant negative emotions (NE) and regulatory capacity (RC) from 4 to 12 months of age, (2) examine maternal and family factors that may affect NE and RC trajectories, (3) examine transactional associations between developing NE and RC, and (4) examine the effect of infant temperament trajectories on negative parenting when toddlers reached 18 months of age. Mothers from 156 families completed a measure of infant temperament when infants were 4, 6, 8, 10, and 12 months of age and completed maternal relationship stress, depression, and family demographics measures when infants were 4 months of age. Information regarding negative parenting was collected when toddlers reached 18 months of age. LGM results suggest that maternal relationship stress and depression influence infant NE development, that high NE early in infancy may compromise the development of infant regulation, and that steeper decreases of infant RC contribute the greatest amount of variance to negative parenting in toddlerhood. The implications for models of early emotion regulation and incorporating changes in temperament over time into developmentally sensitive models (e.g., emerging parenting practices and developmental psychopathology) are discussed.