College of Public Health, Shanghai University of Medicine and Health Sciences, Shanghai, 200124, China.
Department of Health Promotion and Community Health Sciences, School of Public Health, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, 77843, USA.
Arch Womens Ment Health. 2023 Feb;26(1):99-106. doi: 10.1007/s00737-022-01256-2. Epub 2022 Aug 18.
Depression and anxiety are among the most common morbidities during the perinatal period. Very few studies have been conducted to examine the association between paternal childcare involvement and postpartum depression (PPD) and anxiety (PPA) in East Asian cultures. This study aims to examine the association between fathers' involvement in childcare and mothers' mental health and explores the potential mediating effects of the mother and child's health among a national sample of Chinese women. This is a cross-sectional, self-administered online survey of maternal women (N = 778) within 1 year after childbirth in China. The questionnaire comprised of sociodemographics, fathers' childcare involvement, child and mother's physical health, and mothers' postpartum mental health status. A path analysis model was constructed to examine the correlation between paternal childcare involvement and maternal depression and anxiety within 1-year postpartum. The mediating effect of the mother and child's physical health was also explored in the model. Paternal involvement in childcare was significantly associated with lower PPD (β = - .36, p < 0.001) and PPA (β = - .29, p < 0.001) levels of mothers after covariates were adjusted. Furthermore, women's physical health partially mediated the association between paternal involvement and PPD, and child's health partially mediated the association between paternal involvement and PPA and PPD. Our findings emphasize the essential role of father's childcare involvement and the need to promote culturally tailored intervention programs, which may improve the mental health status among Chinese postpartum mothers.
抑郁和焦虑是围产期最常见的疾病之一。在东亚文化中，很少有研究探讨父亲参与育儿与产后抑郁（PPD）和焦虑（PPA）之间的关系。本研究旨在探讨父亲参与育儿与母亲心理健康之间的关系，并探讨在全国范围内的中国女性样本中，母亲和孩子的健康状况对其可能产生的中介作用。这是一项在中国产后 1 年内对产妇（N=778）进行的横断面、自我管理的在线调查。问卷包括社会人口统计学资料、父亲参与育儿、孩子和母亲的身体健康以及母亲产后心理健康状况。构建路径分析模型，以检验父亲参与育儿与母亲产后 1 年内抑郁和焦虑之间的相关性。该模型还探讨了母亲和孩子身体健康的中介作用。在调整了协变量后，父亲参与育儿与母亲的 PPD（β=−.36，p<0.001）和 PPA（β=−.29，p<0.001）水平呈显著负相关。此外，妇女的身体健康部分中介了父亲参与和 PPD 之间的关系，而孩子的健康部分中介了父亲参与和 PPA 和 PPD 之间的关系。我们的研究结果强调了父亲参与育儿的重要作用，以及需要制定针对文化的干预计划，这可能会改善中国产后母亲的心理健康状况。
