Childbirth for some women is a negative experience associated with depressive and post-traumatic symptoms. The preventive actions focusing on helping mothers to cope with negative emotions experienced after childbirth are strongly recommended. It is also recommended both to intervene early and on all women to avoid the risk that these symptoms can worsen in the months after childbirth. The intervention described in the current study is focalized on the elaboration of post-partum negative thoughts and emotion through a writing task, with the purpose to help new mothers to reflect, understand, evaluate and, thus, reformulate the stressful situation with new beliefs and emotions. 176 women aged from 19 to 43 years (M = 31.55, SD = 4.58) were assessed for depression and PTSD in the prenatal phase (T1). In about 96 hours after childbirth they were randomly assigned to either “Making Sense condition” (MS: in which they wrote about the thoughts and emotions connected with delivery and childbirth) or “Control-Neutral condition” (NC: in which they wrote about the daily events in behavioural terms) and then reassessed for depression and PTSD (T2). A follow up was conducted 3 months later (T3) to verify depression and posttraumatic symptoms. The results showed that depressive symptoms decreased both at 96 hours and at 3 months as a result of making-sense task. Regarding the posttraumatic symptoms the positive effect emerged at three months and not at 96 hours after birth.

The main goal of this study was to compare Northern and Southern Italian emerging adult university students, regarding the importance attributed to criteria for adulthood and the levels of life and education satisfaction. Self-report questionnaires were filled by 475 Northern and Southern Italian University students (Age M = 22.91, 76% females, n = 359). Multivariate analysis of variance revealed that Southern emerging adults were more likely to place importance on family capacities, norm compliance, interdependence and role transitions as criteria for achieving adulthood than Northern emerging adults. Regarding gender differences, females were more likely to believe in the importance of norm compliance than males, while males were more likely to espouse the importance of legal transitions. Finally, emerging adults from the North reported higher levels of life satisfaction than their Southern counterparts. We interpreted these findings in light of socio-economical and gender socialization differences among Northern and Southern Italian emerging adults.

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