About this srcd poster session

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Panel information
Panel 4. Cognitive Processes

Abstract

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The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between maternal postpartum depression, parenting, and infant cross-situational self-regulation (SR) at 5 months. Infant SR is critical for cognitive, emotional, and behavioral development, serving as a predictor of future developmental outcomes. Maternal depression can compromise SR, but positive parenting may mitigate these effects, particularly in infancy when SR is sensitive to environmental influences.

This study is a sub-study of clinically diagnosed depressed mothers (n=60) and a matched sample of non-depressed mothers (n=60) and their 5-month-old infants (methods published in [Authors, 2011]). We examined infant self-regulation, operationalized as infants’ ability to modulate reactivity through focusing or shifting attention between tasks, and initiating or inhibiting actions (Rothbart & Derryberry, 1981). The primary SR strategy studied was gaze aversion. Emerging literature identifying models of SR consider it a dual process (Sun et al., 2020), distinguishing the automatic (reactive) versus deliberate processes of regulation. Consequently, the interest of this study was the cross-situational stability in infant gaze, observed during a fear-eliciting episode (reactive SR) and a still-face episode (intentional SR).

Coding was performed by raters blind to parental diagnoses. Measures included:
1. Infant temperament: Assessed with the IBQ-R (Gartstein & Rothbart, 2023), averaging orienting/regulation scores from both parents.
2. Reactive SR: Observed in a Lab-TAB startle task (Goldsmith & Rothbart, 1991) using a hairdryer stimulus, with behaviors coded in 5-second intervals.
3. Intentional SR: Observed in a modified still-face paradigm (Graham et al., 2018), coded in 1-second intervals.
4. Parenting: Mother-infant dyads were observed using modified Emotional Availability Scales (EA Scales, 3rd ed.; Biringen et al., 1998). We coded domains of positive affect/sensitivity, versus negative affect/disengagement.

Listwise deletion yielded a sample of 48 non-depressed and 39 depressed mothers (matched by race, ethnicity, and income). Gender and parity were included as covariates.

Results revealed group differences in intentional SR [F(1,85) = 5.77, p < .05, η² = .05], but not in reactive SR [F(1,85) = 2.63, p > .05, η² = .01]. In the still-face task, infants of depressed mothers were less likely to avert gaze (M=18.21, SD=12.76) than infants of nondepressed mothers (M=23.15, SD=13.38). This suggests maternal depression affects SR in contexts requiring more deliberate regulatory effort.

Infants of nondepressed mothers showed a significant positive relationship between the still-face and fear-eliciting tasks (r=.34, p<.05), supporting the idea that maternal depression disrupts stable regulatory strategies across contexts.

Only positive parenting moderated reactive SR [F(4,82) = 3.49, p < .05, η² = .05], with higher positive parenting linked to more gaze aversion in infants of depressed mothers, but only in the fear-eliciting task (B=.08, p < .05)[See Figure 1]. No moderation was observed in still-face tasks, nor did negative parenting affect SR, indicating that the protective role of positive parenting may be more salient in environments with heightened emotional arousal.

This study underscores the nuanced impact of maternal depression on infant SR, particularly in situations requiring intentional regulation. Ongoing analysis will include SR coding at 24 months, using a modified marshmallow task to explore longitudinal relationships.

Author information

Author	Role
Victoria Manzo, University of Maryland, Baltimore County	Presenting author
Dr. Nanmathi Manian, University of Maryland, Baltimore County	Non-presenting author
Sandrine Nyivih, University of Maryland, Baltimore County Alumni	Non-presenting author

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