Mothers’ psychopathology symptoms and mindful parenting in the postpartum period: The role of parental reflective functioning

Abstract

Postpartum psychopathology has an adverse impact on parenting behaviors and, consequently, on the mother–infant relationship. This study aimed to explore whether the relationship between maternal anxiety and depression symptomatology in the postpartum period and the ability of mothers to adopt a mindful parenting approach is indirect and can be explained by parental reflective functioning. Two hundred ninety five Portuguese mothers of infants aged up to 12 months completed self‐report measures assessing anxiety/depression symptoms, mindful parenting, and parental reflective functioning. Mothers who reported clinically significant anxious and/or depressive symptomatology levels (21%) showed lower levels of mindful parenting and of certainty about the mental states as well as higher levels of prementalizing modes of mental states than mothers with normal symptomatology levels. An indirect effect of depressive symptomatology on mindful parenting through the two dimensions of parental reflective functioning and a direct effect of anxious symptomatology on mindful parenting were found. The results suggest that parental reflective functioning is an important explanatory mechanism of the relationship between depressive symptomatology and mindful parenting, as well as that anxious symptomatology is directly associated with mindful parenting. This study suggests that reducing anxious and depressive symptoms in the postpartum period can promote reflective and mindful parenting skills.

Early psychosocial risk factors and postnatal parental reflective functioning

“…By contrast, in a similar community sample in which PRF was assessed at age 6 months using the PRFQ, Nobre‐Trinidade et al. (2021) reported that higher anxiety scores on the HADS related to lower certainty about mental states and higher pre‐mentalizing modes scores, with no association with interest and curiosity in mental states. Research on parental anxiety and PRF is lacking, as a recent systematic review highlighted (Risi et al., 2021), and it is therefore difficult to draw strong conclusions on the relation between these factors without further investigation.…”

Offline and online parental mentalizing in mothers with symptoms of postpartum depression: Examining the association between self‐reported parental reflective functioning and interactional mind‐mindedness

“…Depression in the postpartum period is highly prevalent, even amongst otherwise healthy mothers (Shorey et al., 2018). The condition has been linked with mentalizing impairments (Georg et al., 2023), negatively influencing the quality of the mother‐infant relationship (Krink et al 2018; Nobre‐Trindade et al., 2021). As the mother's capacity to hold the child's mind in mind throughout the moment‐to‐moment changes in the child's emotional state is considered crucial for sensitive caregiving (Slade, 2007), it is relevant to investigate if self‐reported mentalizing assessed in a non‐interactive, offline context relates to how the mother mentalizes upon the infant in an online context, and how this is expressed when the mother experiences depressive symptoms.…”

On the complex and dimensional relationship of maternal posttraumatic stress disorder during early childhood and child outcomes at school-age

“…These relationships are complicated by the fact that many of these factors are associated with one another, such as the various forms of trauma-related psychopathology, as well as measures of alexithymia, socioeconomic status (SES), PRF, and maternal sensitivity [6,[11][12][13][14] which have multiple interrelations. The same is true for child outcomes: different factors show a complex pattern of univariate associations with each other.…”

“…PTSD resulting from childhood adversity associates also with symptoms of alexithymia (i.e., the difficulty in identifying and naming one's own and others' emotions, 9, 10). These relationships are complicated by the fact that many of these factors are associated with one another, such as the various forms of trauma-related psychopathology, as well as measures of alexithymia, socio-economic status (SES), parental reflective functioning (PRF) and maternal sensitivity (6,(11)(12)(13)(14) which have multiple interrelations. The same is true for child outcomes: different factors show a complex pattern of univariate associations with each other.…”