Protocol Number: 88-CH-0032

Title:

Specificity of Mother-Infant Interaction: The Influence of Maternal Age, Employment Status, and Parenthood Status

Number:

88-CH-0032

Summary:

Research and theory tend to agree when suggesting that certain activities done by mothers have both immediate and delayed consequences for children's mental development in the first years of life.

The everyday interaction between an infant and a caregiver can be broken down into many categories. There are data linking both of these types of interaction to the mental development of children.

The study will focus on the extent to which maternal characteristics (age, employment status, parenthood status, and birth order of the child) influence the relation between maternal social and didactic caregiving and the social and mental development of children.

Mother-infant interaction will be observed when the infants are 5 months old.

When the children are 20 months old, measures of toddler function (e.g., ability to play and language development) and maternal behavior (e.g., encouragement of attention to the environment and I.Q.) will be obtained.

When the children are 48 months old, researchers will measure preschooler psychosocial functioning (e.g., I.Q., cognitive and social competencies) and maternal behavior (e.g., "scaffolding").

Understanding the relation between children's experiences as infants, toddlers, and preschoolers and their eventual intellectual and social functioning is an essential part of normal developmental research.

Sponsoring Institute:

National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)

Recruitment Detail

Type: Participants currently recruited/enrolled

Gender: Male & Female

Referral Letter Required: No

Population Exclusion(s): None

Eligibility Criteria:

INCLUSION CRITERIA:

All subjects are normal volunteers.

At initial recruitment, all mothers will be married women living in intact families with healthy, full-term, first-born infants. Most will be living in intact families.

Prior to inclusion in the sample, basic demographic information will be obtained for all study participants including substitute caregivers but excluding school teachers. Variables include age, race, cultural background, primary language, marital status, SES (as assessed by the Hollingshead Four-Factor Index of Social Status, 1975), and educational level. In addition, for caregivers, information about their experience caring for children and about the peer environment, including the number of children routinely present, their sexes, and their ages, will be obtained.

To the extent that the adolescent sample diverges from sample criteria with respect to marital status and SES, appropriate controls will be used.

Subjects in the Argentine-American and Japanese-American project will be selected to represent families high vs low on appropriate measures of acculturation.

The healthy second born infants of 80 mothers already enrolled in the protocol will also be recruited into the sample at the time of their birth. These infants will be selected to comprise four equal groups based on the gender composition of the sibling dyad: male/male, male/female, female/female, and female/male.

Special Instructions:

Currently Not Provided

Keywords:

Mother-Infant Interaction

Cognitive Development

Maternal Employment

Adoption

Daycare

Adolescent Mothers

Language

Acculturation

Social-Emotional Development

Recruitment Keyword(s):

None

Condition(s):

Adolescent Mothers

Healthy

Mother-Child Relations

Investigational Drug(s):

None

Investigational Device(s):

None

Intervention(s):

None

Supporting Site:

National Institute of Child Health and Human Development

Contact(s):

Patient Recruitment and Public Liaison Office
Building 61
10 Cloister Court
Bethesda, Maryland 20892-4754
Toll Free: 1-800-411-1222
TTY: 301-594-9774 (local),1-866-411-1010 (toll free)
Fax: 301-480-9793

Electronic Mail:prpl@mail.cc.nih.gov

Citation(s):

Birth order and its sequelae

Cognitive representations of self, family, and peers in school-age children: links with social competence and sociometric status

Effects of stress and social supports on mother-child interactions in single and two parent families

• Questions about participating in a study, please contact the Patient Recruitment and Public Liaison Office, CC.
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