1. Objectifs

Intentions :
Les auteurs se questionnent sur les interventions à adopter pour soutenir les mères qui présentent des problèmes de stress et de consommation afin de permettre le développement adéquat de leur enfant.

Questions/Hypothèses :
« We hypothesized that: 1) intervention will prove effective in reducing prenatal maternal stress, and tobacco, alcohol and drug consumption after comparison with the control group; 2) Changes in prenatal variables and postnatal factors, will contribute to infant developmental outcome; and 3) Changes will remain after controlling for the quality of mother-infant interaction, family conflict and infant daycare experience. » (p. 3)

2. Méthode

Échantillon/Matériau :
« Presently, 76 moderate to high risk young mothers (<24 years old; not more than one year of post-secondary education) were randomly assigned to a control or an intervention group. Assessments were made when they were between 16 and 22 weeks pregnant, and three months after birth. » (p. 3)

Type de traitement des données :
Analyse statistique

3. Résumé

« Results show that, contrary to expectations, the intervention proved ineffective in changing maternal levels of prenatal stress or consumption. As such, evidence for foetal programming could not be explained using the experimental design that was proposed. Consequently, the programming hypothesis was examined by way of hierarchical regression analyses. Here, evidence for foetal programming was observed. Specifically, prenatal levels of alcohol consumption were linked to infant salivary cortisol concentrations, and prenatal maternal anxiety was associated to infant cognitive and emotional development. There was marginal support for a relation between major life events (an indicator of stress) and infant emotional development and maternal smoking and infant cortisol concentrations. Postnatal levels of maternal interactive sensitivity, marital adjustment and daycare experience were unrelated to infant cognitive or emotional outcomes, indicating that at the time infant outcome measures were taken, prenatal factors weighed more heavily in predicting infant outcome. » (p. 3)