Maternal-Fetal Attachment Moderates Associations Between Romantic Partnership Quality and Maternal Parenting Distress

• In Event: Poster Session 12
  In Poster Session: PS 12 Topic - Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Abstract

Romantic attachment styles forecast numerous components of the parenting experience, including parenting stress (Nygren et al., 2012; Rholes et al., 2006). However, parents with insecure romantic attachment styles may not always experience high amounts of early parenting stress, suggesting there may be other key factors influencing association. Maternal-fetal attachment (MFA), describing the relationship shared between a pregnant woman and her fetus, is one potential moderator. MFA is associated with postnatal maternal involvement (Siddiqui & Hägglöf, 2000) and optimal infant development (Alhusen et al., 2013). Therefore, strong MFA may protect expecting mothers in insecure romantic partnerships from experiencing difficulties with infant parenting. The current study investigated adult relationship avoidance and anxiety, MFA, and their interactions as predictors of mothers’ early parenting stress. High levels of romantic avoidance and anxiety during pregnancy were hypothesized to predict parenting stress. However, MFA was expected to moderate these associations, with greater MFA expected to attenuate links between avoidance and anxiety and parenting stress.
Participants were 129 primarily racial/ethnic minority women from an ongoing longitudinal study. Second- and third-trimester pregnant women were recruited in a large urban area of the United States during routine prenatal care appointments and completed assessments including the Experiences in Close Relationships – Revised (ECR-R; Fraley et al., 2000) questionnaire, which includes Anxiety and Avoidance subscales, and the Maternal-Fetal Attachment Scale (MFAS; Cranley, 1981). When infants reached seven months, mothers completed the short form of the Parenting Stress Index (PSI; Abidin, 1990). Further, participants provided demographic information and completed the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (Spielberger, 2010).
The above hypotheses were partially supported. After controlling for gestational age at birth, child gender, and maternal trait anxiety, the PSI Parental Distress subscale was predicted by ECR-R Avoidance, β = .28, p = .004. ECR-R Avoidance was also a significant predictor of the Total Parent Stress and Dysfunctional Interaction scores. There was a significant interaction between Avoidance and MFAS in predicting Parental Distress (see Figure 1). Simple slopes analyses demonstrated that at low (-1 SD) levels of MFA, Avoidance was strongly associated with Parental Distress, β = .47, p < .001. In contrast, at high (+1 SD) levels of MFA, there was no significant association between Avoidance and Parental Distress, β = .09, p = .44.
A similar pattern of findings emerged in separate analyses of associations between ECR-R Anxiety, MFAS, and PSI scales with the same covariates. ECR-R Anxiety predicted Parental Distress, β = .20, p = .041, with a similar statistically significant interaction between ECR-R Anxiety and MFAS (see Figure 2). At low levels of MFA, Anxiety was associated with Parental Distress, β = .36, p = .008, but not at high levels of MFA, β = .03, p = .8.
These findings suggest that, during pregnancy, the mother’s perception of a strong emotional bond with her unborn child may help protect against negative influences of an insecure romantic partnership on early parenting distress. Addressing both maternal adult attachment and maternal-fetal attachment may be useful in tailoring interventions to reduce risk of parenting distress.

Authors

• Ava C Palopoli, Wayne State University
  Presenting Author

• Jessica Hruschak, Wayne State University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Toni Lewis
  Non-Presenting Author

• Moriah E. Thomason, New York University School of Medicine
  Non-Presenting Author

• Christopher Joseph Trentacosta, Wayne State University
  Non-Presenting Author