Influence of maternal reflective functioning on mothers’ and children's weight: A follow-up study

Based on cross-sectional research linking poor reflective functionining (RF) to eating disorders, the current follow-up study tested whether maternal RF would explain the variance of mothers’ and children's weight beyond the effects of maternal emotional dysregulation. During pregnancy (Time 1 [T1]), 51 women were administered the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS) and interviewed using the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). Seven months after delivery (Time 2 [T2]), mother–baby dyads who remained in the study (n = 44) were videotaped (Feeding Scale) during their feeding interaction. Last (Time 3 [T3]), the weight of the 34 children who were still in the study was collected at 3 years of age. Maternal AAI-RF at T1 did not correlate with the DERS at T1 nor with the quality of the feeding interacions at T2. However, it correlated, significantly, with maternal body mass index (BMI) at T1, r = −.298, P = .034, and marginally significantly with baby's BMI at T3, r = −.296, P = .089. Moreover, multiple regression models showed a trend indicating that maternal AAI-RF might explain the variance of mothers’ and children's weight beyond the effects of maternal emotional dysregulation. These findings suggest that working on maternal mentalization might contribute to helping prevent childhood obesity from pregnancy.     

When soothing succeeds: Simulating a risk for repeated shaking in abusive head trauma in infants

PurposeTo investigate the observation that perpetrators of abusive head trauma engage in repeated shakings because shaking “works” to quiet the infant.MethodsSixty first-time parent couples individually cared for a programmable model infant in two consecutive 7-min trials. After six minutes of consolable followed by inconsolable crying, parents selected one of three soothing techniques. For trial one, parents were randomized to a “Successful” or “Failed” Soothing Condition. Whether the soothing technique was repeated after trial two was determined by the study investigators. Parents rated their frustration after each trial.ResultsAs hypothesized, parents were more likely to repeat a soothing technique that “worked” in trial one. Compared to fathers, mothers reported more frustration when soothing failed.ConclusionsThat caregivers were more likely to repeat a successful soothing technique converges with perpetrator confessions that crying cessation after shaking may be a reason why shaking is used repeatedly in response to crying.     

The infant with a depressed mother: destruction and creation

From the hypothesis that vitality and creativity in the individual depend on the quality of the dialogue between the ego and the unconcious, the author seeks to show from observations of infant-parent interactions how this dialogue develops. The notion of the experience of the self helps us to describe the way in which mother and baby act upon each other like living mirrors, each reflecting for the other an image of the self. Maternal care, as long as it is disengaged from the sexual excitation, both erotic and aggressive, with which it is charged for each of the partners in the interaction, allows the self to be projected on to the infant's body; the ego–self dialogue then develops its roots in the bodily experience of the infant as it interacts with the world. Post-natal depression, which is frequent, affecting 15–20% of births, is a cause of major distortion in the establishment of the ego–self dialogue. An account of a clinical observation helps us to understand the process as it occurs     

叠音品牌名称对消费者知觉和偏好的影响

品牌名称是重要的品牌资产,在传递品牌价值、构建品牌形象和凸显品牌特征的过程中起到关键作用。以往研究发现,品牌名称的语义特征和语音特征都会对消费者知觉和偏好产生影响,但少有研究考察品牌名称语音特征中叠音的作用。本研究将从婴儿图式的角度,基于刻板印象内容模型,通过4个实验考察叠音品牌名称对消费者知觉和偏好的影响,并检验元音特征和产品类型的调节作用。研究结果表明:(1)与非叠音品牌名称相比,叠音品牌名称会让消费者觉得该品牌更像婴儿,进而感觉该品牌更加温暖,但是能力更低。(2)叠音对于消费者温暖知觉的影响受到元音特征的调节。当品牌名称中含有前元音时,叠音对于温暖知觉的影响会削弱。(3)叠音对于消费者偏好的影响受到产品类型的调节。对于享乐型产品,消费者更偏好叠音品牌名称;对于实用型产品,消费者更偏好非叠音品牌名称。本文为品牌名称的设计提供了指导,同时也丰富了婴儿图式和刻板印象内容模型的理论内涵。     

Seeking sacred pathways: How ritual is being used as a means for spiritual support

ABSTRACT

Baby boomers are confronting new life stages as they navigate the revolution in longevity. Emerging in this journey are new rituals and reinterpretations of old ones that speak to these new life stages. These rituals help provide a grounding and guide to create moments of meaning as we encounter our own aging.     

‘Her Majesty the Baby’: narcissistic states in babies and young children

This article considers narcissistic states in babies and young children with some reference to the myth of Narcissus in Ovid’s Metamorphosis. The object-seeking character of babies from the beginning of life is elaborated in connection with selected research from mother–baby interaction. This forms the backdrop to a discussion of withdrawal into illusions of self-sufficiency and denial of dependence in adverse circumstances. Two clinical cases are discussed in some depth. One boy whose superiority, self-reliance and pseudo maturity is prompted by anxieties around separation as he approaches starting school is considered within the parameters of ordinary transient narcissism. The lengthy psychotherapy of another child, who developed entrenched narcissistic defences as a response to traumatic, abusive and neglectful experiences in early life, and who needed considerable help, is described in greater detail. Some links are made with difficulties associated with the emergence from narcissistic functioning and encountering the pain of separation and loss.     

婴儿图式及其加工的性别差异

婴儿图式 (baby schema, or Kindchenschema) 是指人们对一系列婴儿特征的一种心理表征, 这些特征包括婴儿所特有的高额头、大眼睛和圆脸蛋等知觉特征。婴儿图式可以诱发人们的积极情绪, 并引起关爱、照顾婴儿的行为, 从而满足个体生存以及繁衍的需要。对婴儿面孔的加工存在性别差异, 女性对婴儿特征比男性更敏感, 原因可能有四种：大脑结构的不同、女性独有的情绪反应、女性生殖激素的影响和早期环境的影响。未来的研究可以进一步揭示婴儿图式的特异性神经机制, 并从性别差异入手, 进一步探讨母爱与婴儿图式的相互作用。     

Existential function of babies: Babies as a buffer of death-related anxiety

The present study examined babies as death anxiety buffers with Chinese participants in three experiments. In Experiment 1, death-related thoughts increased college-aged participants' interest in human babies. In Experiment 2, images of newborn animals reduced the number of death-related thoughts recorded by college-aged participants. In Experiment 3, female factory workers who read news articles describing deaths of babies had pessimistic estimations of their own life expectancies. An explanation of these results is provided within a terror management theory framework, with a primary focus on how babies reinforce cultural worldviews and enhance self-esteem via the notion of symbolic immortality. Thus, the anxiety-buffering function of baby is subsumed under cultural worldviews validation and self-esteem enhancement.     

Patterns of maternal responding in postpartum mothers with schizophrenia

Little is known about how schizophrenia might affect how a mother responds to her infant, such as whether responding is reduced or impaired. The aim was to identify, from brief videotaped interactions, whether the responses of mothers with schizophrenia were fewer, less positive, more negative, and more ‘abnormal’ than mothers with affective disorder, and whether their infants (mean age: 15 weeks) lacked activity or initiation to which mothers could respond. Mothers with schizophrenia (N = 14) were as responsive as mothers with affective disorder (N = 31), but they showed markedly low positive responsiveness. Only the schizophrenia group exhibited non-responses as a result of being psychologically withdrawn from the interaction, and abnormal behaviors. Inconsistent to our hypothesis, infants in both groups showed similar levels of activity, initiative and negativity. The findings highlight the need for further research to examine the contribution of maternal response impairments to the developmental vulnerability of this genetically high-risk group.     

Counselling Australian baby boomers: examining the loss and grief issues facing aging distance-separated sibling dyads

It has long been recognised that mature-aged sibling dyads provide each other with emotional support. What has yet to be determined is whether this support function is maintained within the baby boomer generational cohort of sibling dyads who through economic relocation/migration have become separated by distance. As such, this paper highlights the need for research to be conducted into the experiences of baby boomers dealing with sibling loss and grief-related issues without the support of their nuclear and extended family members.