The other side of wellbeing

Infant mental health and maternal mental health are interlinked topics that not surprisingly recur among the research that is carried out on psychological aspects of pregnancy, childbirth and early child development. Concerns about the quality of early parenting, the roots of poor and of effective parenting and the vulnerability and resilience of children, young adults and families have led to a wide range of research using diverse methodologies.

Critical to a better understanding are population based longitudinal cohort studies, allowing long‐term outcomes and the role of mediating variables to be better understood in the context of a wide range of data on perinatal and reproductive factors collected early on, such as those utilizing the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) and Millenium Cohort Study (MCS) databases (Hanington, Ramchandani, & Stein, 2010; Kiernan & Huerta, 2008). The data from these large scale projects are invaluable, however, a whole range of other methods are also able to address developmental and health issues that may affect both infant and parental mental health from different perspectives. The papers published in this edition of the journal reflect this diversity. Vauclair’s work on paternal infant holding biases addresses a biological question with an observational study; Crncec’s review of behavioural approaches to infant sleep problems focuses on the role of learning in supporting change in an area of life causing problems for many parents with young infants, and Araneda and colleagues’ study looks at the associations between attachment style and wellbeing, exploring the part played by maternal representations using visual analogue scale methods. Attachment, both maternal and infant, while often treated in a categorical way, may also be measured for research purposes and a variety of scales have aimed to do this, including those developed by Condon, Corkindale and Boyce (2008) and reviewed by Van den Bergh and Simons (2009), previously published in the journal.

Systematic reviews bring the evidence together from studies that on their own may have not been sufficiently powerful to test the hypotheses put forward. In this edition, the review of tactile stimulation studies by Underdown and colleagues usefully contributes to the debate on the benefits of such an intervention in healthy infants. In contrast’ qualitative studies with relatively small numbers of participants can provide quite different insights and research questions as a result of considering the perspective of those directly involved. Two papers in this edition fall in to this category: Kruger’s work on the ‘other side of caring’ in a South African maternity ward and Thomson and colleagues’ research on women’s experiences of a positive birth following a traumatic birth experience illustrate this point.

At the same time psychological and developmental theory development is vital in providing the right constructs and underpinning to research (Fonagy et al., 2007; Sharp & Fonagy, 2008) and, in many instances, the rationale for specific interventions. Understanding behavioural and trans‐generational mechanisms is key, as is developing and testing appropriate and workable interventions to support the practical and psychological needs of children, parents and families.

Changing behaviour in some way is the usual goal, in the short term and hopefully in the longer term. The preliminary work by Bohr and colleagues published here is an example of the way the aims of an intervention may not always be achieved, in this case increasing maternal sensitivity, but other benefits are identified which may also contribute to improving outcomes for infants and families. Longer term follow‐up and a larger sample size are, however, needed for the research question to be more thoroughly answered.

The context of care also matters: service configuration, provision and training for those involved in working with women, babies and families, are related topics that map on to experiences and interventions. The nature of relationship between professional group membership and philosophy of care, as is shown in the study by Wilson and Sirois, is critical in supporting different ways of giving birth and the different experiences that women will take away with them as a consequence. The recognition that maternal and infant mental health can both be supported and affected by the social and health care environments in which relationships and development take place contributes both to theory and practice in the area of reproductive and developmental psychology.