Attachment Expectations Moderate Links between Social Support and Adjustment During the Transition to Motherhood

• In Event: Attachment representations, stress, and mental health during childhood, adolescence, and the transition to motherhood

Abstract

The social support literature has established significant links between one’s perception of available social support in the face of stressful life events and mental health outcomes (Kelber et al., 2022), including the transition to motherhood (Norhayati et al., 2015). This association is largely attributed to a stress buffering effect whereby available social support helps one cope with challenges in life and diminishes their negative impact (Lakey & Orehek, 2011). Yet, attachment theory posits that individuals are not equal in their ability to effectively utilize social support. Attachment theory argues that securely attached individuals seek and benefit from attachment relationships better than their insecurely attached counterparts (Bowlby, 1973; 1980). As such, we set out to examine the potential moderating role of attachment security (i.e. secure base script knowledge) on links between social support in mothers of young infants and psychological adjustment in a 1-year longitudinal study. We predicted higher social support would predict lower maternal psychological distress and that this relation would be strongest in those higher in security.
The sample consisted of 145 infant-mother dyads who were recruited via online advertisements and flyer postings in an ethnically diverse Canadian city. Data were collected at three time-points (six months apart) over a year beginning when the target infant was six months old. At the initial assessment maternal age ranged from 18 to 49 years (M = 33.52) and 56% of the mothers identified as White. Roughly 69% of the sample from Time 1 participated at Time 3. The present analyses focused on the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS; Zimet et al., 1988) and the Attachment Script Assessment (ASA; Waters & Waters, 2021) collected at Time 1 and four adjustment outcomes: 1) Time 2 Postnatal depression severity (Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale; EPDS, Cox et al., 1987); 2) Time 3 maternal Deficits in Emotion Regulation (DERS; Gratz & Roemer, 2004); 3) Time 3 maternal externalizing and 4) internalizing problems (Achenbach, 1997). Demographic covariates included maternal education, ethnicity, and family income. Postnatal depression severity at Time 1 was used as an additional covariate in the model examining depression severity as an outcome at Time 2 to improve causal inference.
Maternal perceptions of social support were significantly negatively correlated to all outcome measures (rs = -.24 to -.36). A series of moderation analyses using the PROCESS macro for SPSS (Hayes, 2022) revealed that ASA scores significantly negatively moderated the association between perceived social support at Time 1 and maternal adjustment at Time 2 and 3. Results are summarized in Table 1. Interactions were further explored by examining the conditional effects at -1SD, the mean, and 1SD of the moderator (i.e. ASA; Figure 1). Significant moderation effects were observed at higher levels of secure base script knowledge but not at the lowest. Interestingly, those high in script knowledge but low in social support exhibited the most maladaptation. This pattern suggested that those who expect care (i.e. securely attached) but receive minimal support (low perceived social support) find motherhood uniquely dysregulating.

Authors

• Theodore Waters, New York University Abu Dhabi
  Presenting Author

• Yufei Gu, New York University Abu Dhabi

• Victoria Zhu, New York University Abu Dhabi

• Brittany Jamieson

• Danielle Lim

• Gabrielle Schmitt

• Leslie Atkinson, Ryerson University