Poster group
Details of individual items:
poster
The investigation is devoted to the study of intentional actions and mechanisms of their disturbance by the infants in maternal deprivation circumstances. Observation on the activity in self-initiative actions was conducted.Method: infants in the orphanage (21 persons) and babies in the full families (15 persons) were observed from the birth, monthly, during the first year of life. E. Bick method (baby observation in the family), Bazhenova scale for psychic development measurement, still face situation were used. Intention directed to the subject (toy) was measured in the movements such as reaching, touching and snatching the toy within eyeshot, searching of hidden and half-hidden toy. Intention in social actions was studied in still face situation. Adult-directed vocalisations, attention-getting behaviour, and behaviour of babies in reunion episode were explored. Number of intentional actions (social- and object-directed) in two groups were compared.Results:1. it was established, that number of self-initiative actions decreases constantly by children in experimental group from 4,5 months to 12 months (81% of sample);2. average meaning of social development index at 12 month is 4,6 in experimental group (versus 9,9 in control group, p<0,01), object exploration index is 6,5 in experimental group (versus 9,1 in control group, p<0,01);3. there is positive correlation between social development index and object exploration index. More social development index is connected with high initiative in play and exploration of subject;4. in development of social activity: mother's children have more intention to contact and make more attempts to evoke the adult's reaction in still face situation. 'Social active type' of behaviour is predominant by children in families versus 'depressive type ' of behaviour by orphans at 6-month (73% versus 5%). Specific type of 'depressive' pattern is phenomenological described.5. in development of object exploration activity: a) poor exploration and play, lack of self-initiative in face-to-face communication, substitution the active behaviour for gathering or passive observation, hard retardation of preverbal accompaniment of communication; b) average meaning of object exploration index (inclusive reaching, touching and snatching movements, searching of hidden and half-hidden toys in the eyeshot) is 6,5 out of 10 (versus 9,1 in control group, F0<0,01).6. The biggest difference is observed constantly during the year in tests with hidden half-hidden toy searching (F0<0,01).Obtained data is interpreted in terms of object relations' theory. It has been concluded that 1) retardation of intention development is strong diagnostic indicator of the depth of deprivation disturbances; 2) retardation of self initiative development is early marker of deprive disturbances or neglect of the child by the parents, 3) estrangement from the animated so as from unanimated objects has the common issue and increases constantly in the experimental group during the first year of life; 4) especial form of exploration by the deprived infants was described as diagnostic marker; 5) it was proposed and discussed that development of intentional actions depend on courage behaviour forms (by the parents) and anxiety level.
poster
Recently reported findings have linked early visual habituation measures tolevels of parental psychopathology. Poorer visual encoding in female twinsonly (i.e., baseline looking, average length of look per fixation, andmagnitude of habituation) were shown to be positively correlated to twomeasures of maternal and paternal psychological functioning, as assessed bythe Symptom Check List - 90 - R. No significant relationship was observedbetween measures of visual encoding in male twins and levels of parentalpsychopathology. It was suggested that parental psychopathology may disruptthe parent-infant (female) relationship thereby reducing the female twinsability to properly process a visual stimulus. The present study furtherexplores this work by assessing whether salivary testosterone may influencethis relationship. Data from 139 same-sex 5-month-old twins (males 3D 74;females 3D 65) and their parents were used to investigate this question. Themale and female twins were further divided into two each groups based upon amedian spilt of their testosterone level, resulting in four experimentalconditions (male- Lo testosterone 3D 37; male - hi testosterone 3D 37;female - Lo testosterone 3D 3; female - hi testosterone 3D 32). Participantswere included in the present study, if the twins successfully completed avisual habituation task and both parents completed the Symptom Check List -90 - Revised questionnaire in sufficient detail to obtain Global SymptomaticIndex (GSI) and Positive Symptom Total (PST) scores. Visual processing wasassessed using an infant-controlled habituation-recovery procedure. Infantswere habituated (i.e., 50% of baseline) to a multicolored rotating visualstimulus. Following habituation, a novel visual stimulus was presented fortwo trials. Measures of baseline looking, magnitude of habituation, andlength of average look per fixation were computed for analyses in thepresent study. The 90 item Symptom Checklist (SCL-90) was used to assess thepsychopathological status of the parents. No gender differences wereobserved between the three infant visual habituation measures or for the twoparental psychopathology measures. In order to determine whethertestosterone mediated a specific gender - parental relationship,correlations were computed between the four experimental groups and measuresof psychological pathology for both mothers and fathers. Table 1 providesthe correlations between the habituation measures and the SCL-90-R measures.These analyses revealed no significant correlations between the visualhabituation measures and the SCL-90-R measures for a) male twins (both Loand hi testosterone) and their mothers and fathers and; b) female twins (hitestosterone) and their mothers and fathers. However, moderately highcorrelations were observed between female twins (Lo testosterone) baselinelooking and their mothers GSI and PST scores and their fathers GSI score.Likewise, magnitude of habituation was positively correlated with paternalscores on the GSI while average length of look per fixation was correlatedwith maternal scores on the PST and paternal scores on the GSI. The resultssuggest that testosterone may mediate the relationship between female visualhabituation and parental psychopathology. The manner in which testosteroneinfluences the visual habituation and parental psychopathology in femaletwins only will be discussed.
poster
The emerging role of the United States as a peacekeeping force has resulted in the deployment of thousands of American military troops worldwide. A growing concern is that these deployments affect not only the soldiers, but also the partners and young children that are left behind. With soldiers working an average of 12 hours per day, 7 days per week, contact between the soldier and his/her child(ren) is limited during deployment. This longitudinal study focused on relationships between Army soldiers' perceptions of themselves, their mission, and their families. Survey data was collected at three points in time during 1996 and 1997 at military bases throughout Bosnia from over 2,300 American soldiers who had left children at home. The average age of the respondents was 29 years old. Results indicate that families are affected by deployment, and this change is of great concern to today's soldier. Among all soldiers surveyed, 93time spent away from home94 and 93separation from family94 rank as number 1 and number 2 on a list of possible stressors resulting from deployment. 51% of soldiers agree with the statement 93deployment has hurt my family,94 with female soldiers showing the highest level of concern. Similarly, female soldiers report the lowest scores in response to the 93level of family coping in soldier's absence,94 indicating that they are concerned about their families' ability to cope in their absence. Although male soldiers agree that deployment has hurt their families, they show lower levels of concern when a female is left behind in the caretaker role of the children. Interestingly, females show the highest levels of concern when a male is placed in the caretaker role for their children. Today's Army is comprised of 85% males; therefore, most Army support systems target female spouses of soldiers. Little attention has been paid to the needs of male spouses of soldiers, which may be a factor in the reported lower levels of coping. Both males and females believe that the detrimental effects to the family unit remain at a constant level throughout the length of deployment. These findings are particularly noteworthy in peacekeeping situations where length of mission is often unknown and politically determined. The ability of families to cope with deployment seems to depend, at least in part, on the presence of Army implemented family support policies. Soldiers who believe that the 93Army cares for families94 and that their 93leaders care for families94 are more likely to report a higher level of 93family coping94 than soldiers who feel that the Army and its leaders do not care. Soldiers who believe that their families are coping well in their absence show less psychological distress and fewer physical symptoms than soldiers who believe that their families are not coping well in their absence. These findings highlight an aspect of military spending that is often overlooked in the popular media, but appears to have important benefits for both soldiers and their families.
poster
80 parents consulting the pregnancy clinic of the University Hospital ofBasel while expecting their first babies were included in a prospectivelongitudinal study from pregnancy to one and a half year after birth. Thefocus of the investigation was to analyse the influences of parentalpsychopathology and relational disturbances/capacities on the earlydevelopment of the child and the family.During pregnancy a half-structured psycho-dynamic interview (TriadicInterview) was given to the parents to assess the relational capacities ofthe future mother and - if possible - of the father and the parental coupleas a whole. The Triadic Interview mainly focuses on partnershipcharacteristics, on experiences of the pregnancy, on fantasies about thefuture child and on the history and the experiences of the own childhood. Inthe rating procedure, along a carefully elaborated manual, tendencies of thefuture parents to exclude oneself or the partner from the anticipatedrelationship with the child are especially taken into account. Theinter-rater reliability of three independent raters for the resulting mainvariable 'triadic capacity' was .76 (Kendall W). An adapted version of theTriadic Interview was postnatally repeated twice (1 month and 12 monthsafter birth). With self-assessment questionnaires, 4 areas were prenatallyexplored and re-tested one year later: history of origin, couplerelationship, bodily experiences and psychopathological symptoms (SCL-90-R,E(P)DS). In addition to the interviews and questionnaires the families wereobserved in two standardised play situations (Lausanne Triadic Play) at 4and 18 months after the birth to gain data about the dyadic and triadicdynamic of the developing family interaction. The child himself/herself wasdescribed by his parents concerning aspects of his/her temperament (InfantCharacteristic Questionnaire) and tested with the Bayley Scales.The cross-sectional results of the prenatal research phase are presented.The analyses of the data revealed a meaningful significant correlation ofmoderate size between the administered standardised questionnaires and theassessments based on the Triadic Interview. This means that both approachescan provide unique as well as complementary information on individual andrelational capacities and disturbances of future parents.
poster
no abstract
poster
Cross-cultural study of child-rearing practices offers information thatwidens our repertoire regarding the various pathways to both healthy childrearing and potential developmental risks. Unfortunately, research thataddresses cross-cultural development often lack data on mental healthissues, such as maternal depression, anxiety, and the effects of beingcomorbid for both, that can influence mother-child interactions. Studiessuggest variability in the experience and expression of depression andanxiety across cultures. Similarly, studies indicate cultural differencesin infant reactions to stress. Moreover, it appears that infant gendermay play a role in stress responses, particularly where affect isconcerned. The goals of our study were to explore the effects of culture,sex of the infant, and maternal psychpathology on mother-infant emotionexpression and interactions prior to and after a stressful interaction.The data are from a longitudinal study mothers and infants in the UnitedStates (US) and Taiwan (TW). Information was gathered from the mothersduring pregnancy, when their infants were four months of age (Still-FaceProcedure) and 12 months of age (the Strange Situation). Portions of thedata have been presented at the biennial meeting of the Society forResearch in Human Development, Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.A. (1999).Findings are on-going. At the present time, analyses from the four-monthdepression sample are reported and analyses is nearing completion on theanxiety and comorbid groups for maternal and infant affect. Codings ofmaternal touch and toy-use have been piloted for both cultures in thedepression and control samples. A pre-existing study of post-partumdepression in TW had screened pregnant women for depression and matchedthem with controls. A similar procedure was followed in the U.S. forrecruiting mothers. The TW sample (N191) included 27 mothers with ahistory of depression, 53 with a history of anxiety, and 32 who werecomorbid for depression and anxiety. In the US sample (N81), 37 mothershad a history of depression. Maternal and infant affect during play priorto and after the stressful still-face procedure were videotaped and codedon separate passes by different coders. Second by second interraterreliability (Cohen's Kappa) for approximately 25% of the sample was .77for maternal affect and .92 for infant affect. Culture effects werefound. US mothers displayed both more negative affect in pre-play andrecovery (F(1,117)4.48, p .036 & (F(1,117) 4.96, p.028), and morepositive affect in pre-play (F(1,117)6.51, p.012) than did TW mothers.More specifically, US mothers were more positive than TW mothers only inthe in pre-play, whereas no cultural difference in positive affect duringrecovery was found. The difference between pre-play and recovery positiveaffect was greater for U.S. mothers than it was for TW mothers, F(1,131)4.91, p .028. Depression effects were also found. Mothers without ahistory of depression expressed more positive affect that did mothers withsuch a history, regardless of culture or infant sex, F(1,124)5.23, p.024. Surprisingly, infant affect variables were not found to differ byculture, sex, or maternal depression. In summary, maternal affectdiffered by culture and depression, but the effect of culture appeared tobe tempered by maternal reaction to infant stress in the recovery period,suggesting that the demands of a situation, such as comforting an infantafter the stressful still-face segment, may require different displayrules or perhaps override cultural prescriptions for emotion expression..Non-depressed mothers, however, expressed more positive affect thandepressed mothers regardless of culture, segment, or infant sex.Interestingly, infant affect did not vary with culture, gender, ormaternal depression, perhaps reflecting infant temperament and a lack ofsocialization that is yet to come.