Relationship-based intervention with at-risk mothers

Outcome in the first year of life

Bibliographic Data

ID11276504
AuthorsChristoph M Heinicke (University of California, Los Angeles, corresponding author), Neira R Fineman (University of California, Los Angeles), Gloria Ruth (University of California, Los Angeles), S L Recchia, Serena Recchia (University of California, Los Angeles), D Guthrie (University of California, Los Angeles), Carol Rodning (University of California, Davis)
Year1999
Volume20
Issue4
Pages349-374
Publication date1999-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInfant Mental Health Journal (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0163-9641 • E-ISSN: 1097-0355
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1002/(sici)1097-0355(199924)20:4<349::aid-imhj1>3.0.co;2-x
OpenAlexW2013973271
LanguageEN
Citations received46
References cited22

This study shows that a home-visiting, relationship-based intervention, as defined in the UCLA Family Development Project, affects certain areas of family functioning by the time an infant reaches 12 months. Within a randomized trial design, we compared two samples of mothers who were identified as at risk for inadequate parenting in the third trimester of pregnancy with their first child. The primary risk characteristics were poverty and a lack of support. Thirty-one of these mothers experienced the intervention and thirty-three did not. Mothers given the opportunity of a positive, trusting, and working relationship with a weekly home visitor as well as a mother–infant group scored significantly higher on measures of their experienced partner and family support. The intervention also made a significant impact on three critical social-emotional mother–infant transactions in the first year of life. Thus, on a variety of indices including the responses to the Ainsworth Strange Situation, the children in the intervention group were more secure and their mothers more responsive to their needs. Children experiencing the intervention were also more autonomous and task oriented and were encouraged in this regard by their mothers. ©1999 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health.

Developmental psychology · Infant mental health · Intervention (counseling) · Poverty · Psychiatry · Randomized controlled trial · Visitor pattern · Attachment and Relationship Dynamics · Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development · Maternal Mental Health During Pregnancy and Postpartum · Medicine · Psychology

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