Emotional regulation in infants of postpartum depressed mothers

A large body of evidence has accumulated which indicates that infants of postpartum depressed mothers are at risk for negative sequelae, including later psychopathology. However, methodological difficulties including discordant definitions of postpartum depression and the use of paradigms that have used the mother-infant relationship to assess infant emotional expression and regulation lead to a lack of consensus regarding the nature and transmission of that risk. This study sought to address those methodological difficulties by employing an established paradigm designed to elicit emotionality in infants, the Laboratory Temperament Assessment Battery (Lab-TAB; Goldsmith & Rothbart, 1999). Participants were 30 women who met DSM-IV criteria for Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), 50 women who did not meet MDD criteria, and their 8-13 month old infants. The women were recruited from five counties within Iowa, which contain both rural and urban centers. Consistent with state demographics, the sample was predominantly Caucasian. Mother-infant dyads were assessed approximately five months after the mother had completed a diagnostic interview. At that time six episodes from the Lab-TAB designed to elicit fear, anger, and positive affect were conducted. Emotional reactivity was coded used the AFFEX (Goldsmith & Rothbart, 1988) and composite scores were generated for each emotion. Infants of depressed mothers exhibited less intense pleasure to stimuli designed to elicit that emotion. There was also a slight, non-significant, trend for infants of depressed mothers to display more intense fear and to remain fearful longer. There was not a difference between the groups in anger expression. Emotional regulation was examined using a set of procedures set forth by