Yale Child Study Center, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, Connecticut, USA.
Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas, USA.
Infant Ment Health J. 2023 Mar;44(2):218-227. doi: 10.1002/imhj.22048. Epub 2023 Mar 2.
Nancy Suchman's work highlighted the fundamental role of maternal mentalization in maternal addiction, mental health, and caregiving challenges. In this study, we aimed to examine the role of mental-state language (MSL) as a measure of mentalization in prenatal and postnatal narratives and their sentiment in a sample of 91 primarily White mothers from the western United States, followed from the second trimester of pregnancy, through the third trimester, to 4 months postpartum. Specifically, we investigated the use of affective and cognitive MSL in prenatal narratives when mothers visualized caring for their baby and postnatal narratives when mothers compared their prenatal visualization to the current caregiving reality. Results indicated moderate consistency in MSL between the second and third trimesters, but prenatal and postnatal MSL was not significantly correlated. Across all time points, higher use of MSL was related to more positive sentiment, indicating an association between mentalization and positive caregiving representations across the perinatal period. Women used more affective than cognitive MSL in prenatal imagination of caregiving, but this pattern was reversed in their postpartum reflection. Implications on assessing parental mentalization prenatally and considering the relative dominance of affective and cognitive mentalizing are discussed while considering study limitations.
南希·苏克曼的工作强调了母亲心理化在母亲成瘾、心理健康和育儿挑战中的基本作用。在这项研究中，我们旨在研究心理状态语言（MSL）作为心理化测量指标的作用，在一个来自美国西部的 91 名主要为白人母亲的样本中，从妊娠中期到妊娠晚期，再到产后 4 个月，对产前和产后叙述及其情绪进行研究。具体来说，我们调查了母亲在产前叙述中想象照顾婴儿时使用情感和认知 MSL，以及在产后叙述中母亲将产前想象与当前育儿现实进行比较时使用 MSL 的情况。结果表明，MSL 在第二和第三孕期之间具有中等一致性，但产前和产后 MSL 之间没有显著相关性。在所有时间点上，MSL 的使用频率越高，情绪越积极，这表明心理化与围产期积极的育儿表现之间存在关联。在产前想象育儿时，女性使用的情感 MSL 多于认知 MSL，但在产后反思时，这种模式发生了逆转。在考虑研究局限性的同时，讨论了评估父母心理化的重要性以及考虑情感和认知心理化的相对优势。
