Affective and physiological factors predicting maternal response to infant crying.
This study evaluated physiological, affective, and perceptual factors hypothesized to predict how quickly 45 primiparous mothers of 7-9-month-old infants would respond to non-distressed infant crying. Aversiveness ratings of the non-distressed cries of one's "own" infant and physiological reactivity to one's "own" infant crying accounted for a significant amount of the variance in a Cox proportional hazards regression analysis of speed of response. These findings suggest that mothers who have strong affective and physiological responses to non-distressed infant cries may be more likely to respond indiscriminately to attention-seeking infant behaviors.
Del Vecchio
Tamara
T
Department of Psychology, St. John's University, Oakdale, NY 11769, USA. delvecct@stjohns.edu
Walter
Abbe
A
O'Leary
Susan G
SG
D003448:Crying / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006339:Heart Rate / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D018730:Infant Behavior; D008297:Male; D008425:Maternal Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D009034:Mother-Child Relations; D009035:Mothers / Q000523:psychology*; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology; D012044:Regression Analysis