University of Padua, Department of Statistical Sciences, Padua, Italy; and University of Cologne, Institute of Sociology and Social Psychology, Cologne, Germany.
Centre for Longitudinal Studies, Social Research Institute, University College London, London, UK.
Demography. 2021 Aug 1;58(4):1347-1371. doi: 10.1215/00703370-9335177.
Previous research has shown that childbearing is associated with short-term improvements in women's subjective well-being but that these effects depend on the timing and quantum of the birth as well as on the parents' education and socioeconomic status. These studies did not address whether and, if so, how this effect varies according to the mode of conception. This represents an important knowledge gap, given that conceptions through medically assisted reproduction (MAR) have been increasing rapidly in recent decades, exceeding 5% of live births in some European countries. Drawing on nine waves (2009/2010-2017/2018) of the UK Household Longitudinal Study, we use distributed fixed-effects linear regression models to examine changes in women's mental health before, during, and after natural and MAR conceptions. The results show that the mental health of women who conceived naturally improved around the time of conception and then gradually returned to baseline levels; comparatively, the mental health of women who conceived through MAR declined in the year before pregnancy and then gradually recovered. The findings also indicate that women's happiness decreased both two years and one year before an MAR conception and then increased above the baseline in the year of pregnancy. We further show that the deterioration in mental health and subjective well-being before an MAR conception affects both partners, which could be part of a longer process in which the partners potentially suffer from stress related not solely to the MAR treatments themselves but also to the experience of subfertility.
先前的研究表明，生育会对女性的主观幸福感产生短期的积极影响，但这些影响取决于生育的时间、数量以及父母的教育程度和社会经济地位。这些研究并未探讨这种影响是否以及如何因受孕方式的不同而有所不同。鉴于近几十年来，通过医学辅助生殖（MAR）的受孕方式迅速增加，在一些欧洲国家已超过活产儿的 5%，这代表了一个重要的知识空白。本研究利用英国家庭纵向研究的九个波次（2009/2010 年至 2017/2018 年），采用分布式固定效应线性回归模型，考察了自然受孕和 MAR 受孕前后女性心理健康的变化。结果表明，自然受孕的女性的心理健康在受孕前后有所改善，然后逐渐恢复到基线水平；相比之下，通过 MAR 受孕的女性在怀孕前一年的心理健康状况下降，然后逐渐恢复。研究结果还表明，女性在 MAR 受孕前两年和一年时的幸福感下降，然后在怀孕当年高于基线水平。我们进一步表明，MAR 受孕前心理健康和主观幸福感的恶化会影响到双方，这可能是一个更长的过程的一部分，在这个过程中，伴侣可能会因与 MAR 治疗本身无关的压力而受苦，不仅仅是因为不孕。
