title: Expectant father's stress--due to the mother's expectations?
abstract: Despite the increased attention to the role of the father in the childbearing family, relatively little is known of those factors that facilitate or hinder the transition to parenthood. To study the relationship between stress in the prospective father and congruence of attitudes between husband and wife regarding the projected role of the father with the newborn, 103 prenatal couples were studied. Results supported the position that anxiety in the father increased as discordance between husband and wife increased regarding the projected father role. No relationship was found between anxiety and the amount of projected involvement by the father in child care.
mesh_terms: D001007:Anxiety; D005190:Family; D005220:Fathers / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009035:Mothers / Q000523:psychology*; D010332:Paternal Behavior; D011247:Pregnancy; D012380:Role; D013315:Stress, Psychological