Women’s Word Use in Pregnancy: Associations With Maternal Characteristics, Prenatal Stress, and Neonatal Birth Outcome

Abstract

Background: Experiencing high levels of stress during pregnancy can impair maternal well-being and fetal development. Consequently, unbiased assessment of maternal psychological state is crucial. Self-report measures are vulnerable to social desirability effects. Thus, implicit measures, such as word choice analysis, may offer an alternative.Methods: In this longitudinal online-study, 427 pregnant women described their emotional experiences in writing and additionally responded to self-report questionnaires assessing symptoms of prenatal stress and depression. The written texts were analyzed with a computerized text analysis program. After birth, 253 women provided information on birth outcome.Results: Word use differed significantly depending on maternal socioeconomic (e.g., marital status) and pregnancy-related characteristics (e.g., parity). Prenatal stress and depressive symptoms were associated with more frequent use of negative emotion words and words of anxiety, as well as with less first-person plural, but not singular pronoun use. Negative emotion and cognitive mechanism words predicted birth outcome, while self-report measures did not.Conclusion: In addition to self-report measures, word choice may serve as a useful screening tool for symptoms of depression and stress in pregnant women. The findings on pronoun use may reflect women’s changing experience of self-identity during the transition to motherhood.

Seasonal variation in salivary cortisol but not symptoms of depression and trait anxiety in pregnant women undergoing an elective caesarean section

“…However, it is also noteworthy that our study and many others utilised self-report measures of depression and anxiety symptoms which may have influenced findings, as self-report measures are potentially subject to bias due to socially desirable responding. For example Schoch-Ruppen et al (2018) identified different associations to birth outcomes when utilising self-report and implicit assessment of maternal mood. As such, whilst the EPDS and STAI are well-established and validated measures it will be important to investigate the association utilising non-self-report measures.…”

Linguistic Markers in Women’s Discussions on Miscarriage and Abortion Illustrate Psychological Responses to Their Experiences

“…Researchers have shown sexual abuse victims who used more positive emotion words when writing about the abuse exhibited fewer depressive symptoms and showed improvement in sexual health (Pulverman et al, 2015). Similarly, researchers found the more negative emotions words pregnant women used to describe their stress, the more likely they were to experience depression (Schoch-Ruppen et al, 2018). Overall, positive emotion words are associated with better psychological adjustment, while increased negative emotion word use tends to reveal people's psychological struggle to cope.…”

Use of Geographic Information Systems to Explore Associations between Neighborhood Attributes and Mental Health Outcomes in Adults: A Systematic Review

“…Articles were included if they: (a) targeted mostly community-dwelling adults; (b) used a validated mental health outcome measure to assess depressive symptoms or psychological distress; (c) used GIS techniques in any study design phase; (d) included neighborhood attributes as main exposure; (e) included quantitative analysis; and (f) were peer-reviewed articles published in English. Articles were excluded if they focused on: (a) children or adolescents only; (b) pregnant women due to their temporary and unique risk factors associated with childbearing [29]; or (c) qualitative research, literature reviews, discussion papers or editorials.…”