title: Maternal depression and the learning-promoting effects of infant-directed speech: Roles of maternal sensitivity, depression diagnosis, and speech acoustic cues.
abstract: The hypothesis that the associative learning-promoting effects of infant-directed speech (IDS) depend on infants' social experience was tested in a conditioned-attention paradigm with a cumulative sample of 4- to 14-month-old infants. Following six forward pairings of a brief IDS segment and a photographic slide of a smiling female face, infants of clinically depressed mothers exhibited evidence of having acquired significantly weaker voice-face associations than infants of non-depressed mothers. Regression analyses revealed that maternal depression was significantly related to infant learning even after demographic correlates of depression, antidepressant medication use, and extent of pitch modulation in maternal IDS had been taken into account. However, after maternal depression had been accounted for, maternal emotional availability, coded by blind raters from separate play interactions, accounted for significant further increments in the proportion of variance accounted for in infant learning scores. Both maternal depression and maternal insensitivity negatively, and additively, predicted poor learning.
authors: University of Colorado Denver, , United States. Electronic address: peter.kaplan@ucdenver.edu.
authors: Peter S
authors: PS
authors: Kaplan
authors: University of Colorado Denver, , United States.
authors: Christina M
authors: CM
authors: Danko
authors: University of Colorado Denver, , United States.
authors: Anna M
authors: AM
authors: Cejka
authors: University of Colorado Denver, , United States.
authors: Kevin D
authors: KD
authors: Everhart
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000928:Antidepressive Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology; D002657:Child Development; D003463:Cues; D003863:Depression / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000523:psychology*; D005006:Ethnicity; D005145:Face; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007858:Learning; D008297:Male; D009035:Mothers / Q000523:psychology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D013061:Speech Acoustics; D055815:Young Adult
chemical_list: D000928:Antidepressive Agents
keywords: Associative learning; Infant-directed speech; Maternal sensitivity; Postpartum depression