Associations between prenatal maternal mental health indices and mother–infant relationship quality 6 to 18 months’ postpartum: A systematic review

Maternal mental disorders can significantly impact on children's psychosocial and psychological development, incurring substantial ongoing economic and personal costs. A key mediating mechanism is mother–infant relationship quality (MIRQ). Research studies and perinatal mental health screening initiatives have predominantly focused on depressive symptoms and perinatal depression as predictors of MIRQ. While maternal depression is associated with suboptimal MIRQ, the findings have not been consistent. Personality characteristics are associated with parenting and proneness to depression, presenting a potential addition to prenatal mental health assessment. We conducted a systematic review of studies that have examined the link between prenatal depressive symptoms and/or personality characteristics with postnatal MIRQ. Our findings suggest that both maternal personality traits and depressive symptoms measured in early pregnancy are associated with postnatal MIRQ. A measure of personality characteristics may enhance prenatal mental health assessment, affording opportunities for targeted intervention commencing in pregnancy to improve MIRQ, parenting, maternal mental health outcomes, and infant psychosocial and psychological development, and thereby contributing to the reduction of human and economic cost burdens.     

Male callers to an Australian perinatal depression and anxiety help line—Understanding issues and concerns

There is increasing recognition of the issues facing men in the perinatal period. Vulnerability factors and issues in the partner relationship contribute to mental health risk and can impact the quality of the father–infant relationship. Yet, there is limited understanding of fathers’ help-seeking when they or their partner are experiencing mental health issues in the context of caring for a new baby. The present study examines fathers’ contacts with the Perinatal Anxiety and Depression Australia (PANDA) National Helpline. The study reviewed contacts from fathers and their identified needs for assistance, relationship issues, and support needs; 70% of male callers (N = 129) reported concerns about the mother's mental health, and 57% were concerned about relationship breakdown. Significant numbers of men raised issues about their own mental health (43%) and many were concerned about the impact of maternal mental state on the relationship with the infant. When compared to community data, there were elevated rates of concerns about depression and anxiety. Men also described difficulties with the fathering role and with regulating their own feelings of guilt and frustration. These findings highlight the needs of men for support when a mother experiences perinatal problems and also the risk for distress in fathers.     

Sex-specific variation in facial masculinity/femininity associated with autistic traits in the general population

Reports linking prenatal testosterone exposure to autistic traits and to a masculinized face structure have motivated research investigating whether autism is associated with facial masculinization. This association has been reported with greater consistency for females than for males, in studies comparing groups with high and low levels of autistic traits. In the present study, we conducted two experiments to examine facial masculinity/femininity in 151 neurotypical adults selected for either low, mid-range, or high levels of autistic traits. In the first experiment, their three-dimensional facial photographs were subjectively rated by 41 raters for masculinity/femininity and were objectively analysed. In the second experiment, we generated 6-face composite images, which were rated by another 36 raters. Across both experiments, findings were consistent for ratings of photographs and composite images. For females, a linear relationship was observed where femininity ratings decreased as a function of higher levels of autistic traits. For males, we found a U-shaped function where males with mid-range levels of traits were rated lowest on masculinity. Objective facial analyses revealed that higher levels of autistic traits were associated with less feminine facial structures in females and less masculine structures in males. These results suggest sex-specific relationships between autistic traits and facial masculinity/femininity.     

A failure to differentiate

The K. J. Rust and T. S. Kendler paper (1987, Developmental Review, 7, 326–362) makes two claims to publication: (1) it claims to show (and implicitly, to show for the first time) that a nonselective learning model such as Spence's can fit the basic phenomenon of independent subproblem learning, and (2) it claims two experimental tests of the nonselective theory versus the differentiation theory interpretations of independent subproblem learning. Neither claim is valid and both claims reflect a failure to differentiate the literature. Moreover, Kendler's basic assumption of a developmental difference in the nature of learning is questionable.     

Assessing potency of high- and low-preference reinforcers with respect to response rate and response patterns

Previous research has suggested that the availability of high-preference stimuli may override the reinforcing efficacy of concurrently available low-preference stimuli under relatively low schedule requirements (e.g., fixed-ratio 1 schedule). It is unknown if similar effects would be obtained under higher schedule requirements. Thus, the current study compared high-preference and low-preference reinforcers under progressively increasing schedule requirements. Results for 3 of the 4 participants indicated that high-preference stimuli maintained responding under higher schedule requirements relative to low-preference stimuli. For 1 participant, high-preference and low-preference stimuli were demonstrated to be equally effective reinforcers under increasing schedule requirements. Implications with respect to rate of performance and response patterns are discussed.     

The child in time: the influence of parent-child discussion about a future experience on how it is remembered

We investigated the influence of preparation provided by parents on preschoolers' recall. One day before children participated in a staged novel event, parents discussed the event with their child either with (verbal+photos) or without (verbal) photographs. Parents and children in a control condition read an unrelated story. Then 8-10 days later the children were interviewed about the event. Children in the verbal+photos condition recalled significantly more than those in the control condition. Parental preparation style (e.g., evaluations, hypothetical language) was associated with the child's contributions to the preparatory discussion, but no aspect of parent or child style or content was associated with children's verbal recall. Similarly, there were no significant associations between children's performance on a task of episodic future thinking, and their preparatory discussion or recall, although episodic future thinking was strongly associated with language ability. The potential underlying mechanisms and theoretical implications are discussed.     

Governing Humanity

In the United Kingdom, clinical governance has become a master narrative for health care over the last decade. While many see this political imperative as embodying both enlightening and humanistic goals, I argue that it has also become an apparatus for resuscitating a hypermodernist worldview which further conceals the political drivers of health care delivery. While resistance to clinical governance seems futile, insistence on the inclusion of historical analysis in understanding modern health care delivery may be profitable. Drawing from selected dramatic texts by Henrik Ibsen, an historical moment of clinical governance may be analysed showing the complex interplay of the personal, social, empirical and ethical dimensions of health care delivery.     

Enhanced perceptual processing of speech in autism

Theories of autism have proposed that a bias towards low-level perceptual information, or a featural/surface-biased information-processing style, may compromise higher-level language processing in such individuals. Two experiments, utilizing linguistic stimuli with competing low-level/perceptual and high-level/semantic information, tested processing biases in children with autism and matched controls. Whereas children with autism exhibited superior perceptual processing of speech relative to controls, and showed no evidence of either a perceptual or semantic processing bias, controls showed a tendency to process speech semantically. The data provide partial support to the perceptual theories of autism. It is additionally proposed that the pattern of results may reflect different patterns of attentional focusing towards single or multiple stimulus cues in speech between children with autism and controls.     

Determinants of phrasing effects in rat serial pattern learning

Two experiments investigated how brief pauses introduced into serial patterns as phrasing cues would affect pattern learning in rats. In Experiment 1, a 24-element pattern consisted of eight 3-element chunks, whereas a 20-element pattern consisted of four 5-element chunks. In both patterns, 3.0-s temporal pauses placed at chunk boundaries (synchronous phrasing cues) facilitated learning compared to no phrasing. Cues "out of sync" with pattern structure (asynchronous phrasing cues) facilitated learning for the 24-element pattern and retarded learning for the 20-element pattern. Evidence suggested that in the latter case, 3.0-s pauses served as "blank" trials that induced rats to "skip" to the next serial position in sequence. In Experiment 2, shorter 0.5-s pauses served as phrasing cues in the 20-element pattern of Experiment 1. Synchronous short cues facilitated learning, whereas asynchronous phrasing cues had no effect. Furthermore, removal of synchronous cues produced deficits in performance on formerly cued trials, whereas removal of asynchronous cues had no effect. The results of Experiment 2 support the notion that in both experiments phrasing cues served as discriminative cues and indirectly suggest that rats are concurrently sensitive to pattern element cues, extra-sequence cues (such as phrasing cues), and to the relative timing of sequential events.     

The role of working memory in decoding emotions

Decoding facial expressions of emotion is an important aspect of social communication that is often impaired following psychiatric or neurological illness. However, little is known of the cognitive components involved in perceiving emotional expressions. Three dual task studies explored the role of verbal working memory in decoding emotions. Concurrent working memory load substantially interfered with choosing which emotional label described a facial expression (Experiment 1). A key factor in the magnitude of interference was the number of emotion labels from which to choose (Experiment 2). In contrast the ability to decide that two faces represented the same emotion in a discrimination task was relatively unaffected by concurrent working memory load (Experiment 3). Different methods of assessing emotion perception make substantially different demands on working memory. Implications for clinical disorders which affect both working memory and emotion perception are considered.