Influence of dyadic matching of affect on infant self-regulation.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Affective behavioural matching during face-to-face interaction fosters the transition from mutual regulation to infant self-regulation. Optimum midrange models of mother-infant interaction hold that moderate degrees of dyadic matching facilitate infant socio-emotional development. The aim of this study was to examine which degree of dyadic matching is most beneficial for infant self-regulation. METHODS: To evaluate this model, 3 groups of highly, midrange and poorly matched dyads were created from a mixed sample of 68 dyads with healthy and post-partum depressed mothers and their infants (age range = 1-8 months, mean age = 3.9 months). Mother-infant interactions were videotaped in the face-to-face still-face paradigm (FFSF) and micro-analytically coded. Specifically, the relation between affective behavioural matching in FFSF play and infant positive and negative affect in FFSF still face and FFSF reunion was explored. RESULTS: Contrary to our expectation, we found a monotonous trend for all groups: the more matching in FFSF play, the more positive and less negative affect the infant showed in FFSF still face and FFSF reunion, respectively. CONCLUSION: The present findings further illuminate the association between different degrees of dyadic matching in early mother-infant interaction and infant self-regulation. Further research should focus on the integration and replication of findings and conceptual approaches to further evaluate and refine the concept of midrange matching and make it applicable to therapeutic work with mothers and their infants.

Effects of postpartum anxiety disorders and depression on maternal self-confidence.

Low maternal self-confidence may damage the early mother-infant relationship and negatively influence infant development. The goal of this study was to test whether a current and previous history of DSM-IV anxiety and depressive disorders is associated with maternal self-confidence two weeks after delivery. Postpartum anxiety disorder and depression was diagnosed according to DSM-IV criteria in a community sample of 798 women. The data showed a significant link between current postpartum anxiety and depressive disorders and maternal self-confidence. Furthermore, women with a depression or anxiety disorder in their previous psychiatric history scored lower in maternal self-confidence. There is a need for appropriate preventive programmes to promote maternal self-confidence. With such programmes it is possible to prevent infant developmental disorders which might result from reduced feelings of maternal self-confidence and associated maternal interaction behaviour.

Interactive coordination of currently depressed inpatient mothers and their infants during the postpartum period.

In healthy mother-infant dyads, interactions are characterized by a pattern of matching and mismatching interactive states with quick reparation of mismatches into matches. In contrast, dyads in which mothers have postpartum depression show impaired mother-infant interaction patterns over the first few months of the infant's life. The majority of studies that have examined such interaction patterns have drawn on community samples rather than on depressed inpatient samples of mothers who were in a state of current depression at the time of assessment. To date, no study has investigated specific microanalytic patterns of interactive coordination between depressed German mothers and their infants using the Face-to-Face Still-Face paradigm (FFSF). The primary goal of this study was to evaluate specific patterns of dyadic coordination and the capacity for repairing states of miscoordination in an inpatient sample of postpartum currently depressed mothers and their infants as compared with a healthy control group. A sample of 28 depressed inpatient German mothers and their infants (age range = 1-8 months, M age = 4.06 months) and 34 healthy dyads (range = 1-8 months, M age = 3.89 months) were videotaped while engaging in the FFSF. A focus was placed on the play and reunion episodes. Compared with healthy dyads, dyads with depressed mothers showed less coordination of positive matched states and longer latencies when repairing interactive mismatching states into positive matched states. Clinical implications are discussed.