Effect of Prenatal Depressive Symptoms on Dynamic Mother and Infant Emotion Regulation and Coregulation Processes

• In Event: Bidirectional Influences Among Mother-Child Dyads: Exploring Child-Directed Effects Across Multiple Timescales

Abstract

The origins of well-regulated mother-infant interactions can be traced to the prenatal period (Barker, 1990; Roubinov et al., accepted). Prenatal depressive symptoms influence not only mothers’ emotion regulation processes, but may also undermine their infants’ ability to reap the benefits of maternal coregulation (e.g., Goodman & Gotlib, 1999; Davis et al., 2018; Piazza et al., 2020). Less well understood are the effects of infants on their mothers’ emotional functioning, as well as whether prenatal depressive symptoms impede mothers’ ability to delight in playful interactions. Further, despite being an essential aspect of emotion regulation, little is known about the temporal dynamics of emotion regulation and coregulation (Cole, Martin, & Dennis, 2004; Silk, 2019). By examining the bidirectional ebb and flow of mothers’ and their infants’ emotions, we can gain insight into whether prenatal depressive symptoms impact processes of emotion regulation and coregulation. 

With a sample of 210 low-income Mexican-origin mother-infant dyads (infants: 52.2% female), we hypothesized that maternal prenatal depressive symptoms would be associated with (a) less adaptive mother and infant emotion self-regulatory processes, in terms of emotional equilibrium, volatility, carryover in emotions from one second to the next, and feedback loops in emotions; and (b) less adaptive mother- and infant-driven emotion co-regulatory processes, as indexed by the effect of one partner’s affect at one second in time on the other partner’s affect the following second. Women reported on their prenatal depressive symptoms using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS; Cox, Holden, & Sagovsky, 1987; α = .86). Women also reported on prenatal risk factors, their child’s biological sex, and postpartum depressive symptoms. Observed mother and infant affect during free play at 24 weeks postpartum was coded using an adapted version of the Infant and Maternal Regulatory Scoring Systems (IRSS and MRSS; Tronick & Weinberg, 1990). 

In order to evaluate whether prenatal depressive symptoms accounted for differences in within-dyad emotion regulatory processes, dynamic structural equation modeling (DSEMs; Asparouhov, Hamaker, & Muthén, 2018) was conducted using Mplus (Mplus v.8.3; Muthén & Muthén; 1998-2017). Mothers who reported more prenatal depressive symptoms exhibited more emotional volatility while playing with their infants; their infants were also more emotionally volatile. Prenatal depressive symptoms also predicted mother- and infant-driven coregulatory processes. The dampening effect of mothers’ positive affect on their infants’ subsequent negative affect was weaker among dyads where mothers reported greater prenatal depressive symptoms. In contrast, the amplifying effect of infants’ positive affect on their mothers’ subsequent positive affect was stronger among dyads where mothers reported greater prenatal depressive symptoms. 

Our results illustrate the impact of prenatal depressive symptoms on postpartum dyadic interactions, even after accounting for concurrent maternal depressive symptoms. These results build on extant work that prenatal depressive symptoms are related to infants’ negative emotionality and also may impede the typical “external regulatory” effect mothers have on their infants (e.g., Feldman, 2003; Goodman et al., 2017; Moore & Calkins, 2004; Reck et al., 2011; Tronick & Beeghly, 2011). Prenatal depressive symptoms may also augment the effect of fluctuations in their infants’ affect on their mothers, which bears implications for preventive and intervention efforts. 

Authors

• Jennifer Anne Somers, University of California - Los Angeles
  Presenting Author

• Linda J. Luecken, Arizona State University
  Non-Presenting Author