Sensitive parenting is important for promoting the parent-child relationship and children’s emotional, cognitive, and social development. Parental factors related to sensitive parenting are...Show moreSensitive parenting is important for promoting the parent-child relationship and children’s emotional, cognitive, and social development. Parental factors related to sensitive parenting are depression and parental self-efficacy. The aim of this study was to explore the relationship between depression and sensitive parenting, and whether parental self-efficacy mediates this association. Participants were 17 Dutch mothers and 4 Dutch fathers of children aged 3-5 years. Parents played 5-10 minutes with their child during two measurement moments, while the researcher was present through a Microsoft Teams connection. A video of the playing was recorded. In between the two measurement moments, parents completed the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression-questionnaire (CES-D) and the Me as a Parent-questionnaire (MaaP). Afterwards, the video recordings were encoded according to the Ainsworth sensitivity scale. Only the relation between depression and sensitivity was significant, where depression was positively related to sensitivity. There was no indication found for a mediational role of parental self-efficacy in the relation between depression and sensitivity. Explanatory theories, limitations and practical implications were discussed. Future research will have to show which other factors can explain these unexpected findings.Show less
The aim of this study was to investigate the relation between parental mental well-being and parenting skills and whether this relationship differs based on the child's temperament. Parenting...Show moreThe aim of this study was to investigate the relation between parental mental well-being and parenting skills and whether this relationship differs based on the child's temperament. Parenting skills are crucial factors in a child's emotional, cognitive, social, and behavioral development. Data were collected from 20 parents of young children (3 - 5 years old). Parenting skills were assessed using self-report questionnaires regarding confidence in parenting, reflective capacity, and parental sensitivity. The child's temperament was also assessed through questionnaires filled out by the parents. All multiple regressions were non-significant, and the relationships between parental mental well-being and parenting skills were not moderated by the child's temperament. This means that parental mental well-being and the child's temperament were not sufficiently predictive of parental self-confidence, reflective capacity, and parental sensitivity in parenting. By examining the correlations, a moderate positive relationship was found between parental mental well-being and their confidence in parenting. Parents with higher mental well-being had more confidence in their parenting. Parental mental well-being was negatively associated with their reflective capacity, indicating that parents with lower mental well-being displayed higher levels of reflective capacity. A moderate positive relationship was found between the child's temperament and parental sensitivity, suggesting that parents of children with a more challenging temperament were generally more sensitive in their parenting.Show less
This thesis covers a pilot study that examines whether Dutch infants can distinguish lexical tonal patterns in pseudowords. It is inspired by Sato et al.’s 'Development of Hemispheric...Show moreThis thesis covers a pilot study that examines whether Dutch infants can distinguish lexical tonal patterns in pseudowords. It is inspired by Sato et al.’s 'Development of Hemispheric Specialization for Lexical Pitch–Accent in Japanese Infants' (2010). Sato et al. found that Japanese infants can distinguish lexical tonal patterns in Japanese disyllabic words, and that they start processing these stimuli mostly in the left hemisphere (rather than bilaterally) as they get older in their first year of life, suggesting that Japanese infants perceive lexical pitch-accent as a lexical acoustic cue. Since Dutch does not use pitch-accent as a lexical cue, we would not expect Dutch infants to start processing tonal patterns in the left hemisphere as they get older within their first year. The first step to examining this expectation is carrying out a behavioural discrimination task to establish whether Dutch infants can distinguish lexical tonal patterns in pseudowords in the first place. Only then does it become fruitful to carry out a NIRS experiment like Sato et al. to investigate in what parts of the brain Dutch infants process lexical tonal patterns, and whether this differs as they get older. We found that Dutch infants do seem to be able to distinguish lexical tonal patterns in pseudowords. Though the sample size of this pilot is small, the effect that we found is of such significance that we expect to find it in the larger sample size of the official study as well, showing that Dutch infants can distinguish words on the basis of their tonal pattern. We therefore expect that performing a NIRS study like Sato et al. (2010) will be feasible.Show less
The purpose of this research was to examine the role of fathers’ sensitivity and marital satisfaction in developing children’s externalizing problem behavior and to gain more understanding into...Show moreThe purpose of this research was to examine the role of fathers’ sensitivity and marital satisfaction in developing children’s externalizing problem behavior and to gain more understanding into this relationships by investigating the possible mediation of fathers sensitivity. Previous research has shown that children develop less externalizing problem behavior when their fathers are more sensitive towards them and when their fathers are satisfied with their marital relationship. Including fathers in the current research is unique because of the limited availability of research about the role of fathers in children’s development. The data for this study is collected by home visits and questionnaires from one hundred fathers and their two oldest children aged between three and six years old. To be included in this study fathers needed to be born in the Netherlands and speaking the Dutch language fluently. The results revealed that fathers’ higher marital satisfaction is related to less externalizing problem behavior, but only for the second child. The marital satisfaction and sensitivity of the fathers were not related. The fathers’ sensitivity was also unrelated to the externalizing problem behavior of both children. There was no mediation of sensitivity between the marital satisfaction of fathers and the externalizing problem behavior of both children. It is important to improve such research and study the interaction of fathers with their children. Because more knowledge about the influence of fathers’ marital satisfaction on the interaction with the child could help to reveal more information about parental traits that fathers possess that could influence children’s overall development. We suggest that follow-up studies including fathers from different social classes and ethnicities could shed more light on the influence of fathers’ sensitivity and marital satisfaction on the development of externalizing problem behavior in children.Show less
Objective: The aim of this study was to assess whether the psychometric properties of a new version of the Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly (IQCODE) for elderly migrants...Show moreObjective: The aim of this study was to assess whether the psychometric properties of a new version of the Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly (IQCODE) for elderly migrants(IQCODE-sf-M) has better predictive quality for dementia than the original version in short form (IQCODE-sf) for dementia in elderly migrants with low or no education. The original version IQCODE-sf contains 16 items and the IQCODE-sf-M contains 21 items, of which 11 items are newly added, assuming to be less culturally biased.Methods: This study is a case control design. In this study 111 patients of the memory clinic and 50 healthy participants with the age of 55 years or older were included. The patient group was divided in three groups; dementia (n = 49), MCI (n = 34) and cognitively healthy (n = 28). At least 50% of participants in the patient sample were illiterate. The informants of the participants filled out the IQCODE, for example a caregiver or relative. Results: The area under the curve (AUROC) of the IQCODE-sf was 0.86. A cut-off point of 3.69 yielded a sensitivity of 88% and a specificity of 74%. The AUROC of the IQCODE-sf-M was 0.87. A cut-off point of 3.57 yielded a sensitivity of 81% and a specificity of 86%. We found no statistically significant difference in the psychometric properties between the new modified IQCODE (IQCODE sf-M) and IQCODE in short form (IQCODE-sf).Conclusion: In this study it has been shown that the original version of the IQCODE in short form works fine for the elderly migrants in the clinical and community settings and could not be improved by adding 11 new itemsShow less
Introduction: Parental sensitivity has been shown to be important for a child’s healthy development. Most research on parenting has been conducted with mothers, with research on fathering lagging...Show moreIntroduction: Parental sensitivity has been shown to be important for a child’s healthy development. Most research on parenting has been conducted with mothers, with research on fathering lagging behind. In the present study, we, therefore, focused on fathers. It was examined whether the use of an intervention that stimulated physical contact, i.e., a baby carrier, would increase fathers’ sensitivity, and whether this association was mediated by testosterone. Method: Participants in this study were 38 men (Mean age = 34.60, SD = 5.02) who recently became fathers. Infant age ranged from 8 to 12 weeks old at the start of the intervention. Fathers were asked to use a baby carrier for 21 days. Sensitivity was observed before and after the intervention in a free play setting. Use of the baby carrier was measured with warmth sensors on the baby carrier. Testosterone levels are measured by taking saliva samples. Results: Men used the baby carrier on average 33 minutes per day. Results showed no relation between the use of the baby carrier (i.e. physical contact) and testosterone and no relation between testosterone and sensitivity. This means that the relationship between physical contact and sensitivity was therefore not mediated by testosterone. Conclusion: Low levels of baby carrier use may not be enough to increase sensitivity in fathers. In addition, future research could include a larger and more diverse sample to examine the relations between physical contact, testosterone and sensitivity.Show less
Aggressive behavior in infants is a predictor of an unfavorable development later in life. Current study investigates the relation between infant aggressive behavior, regulation capacity and...Show moreAggressive behavior in infants is a predictor of an unfavorable development later in life. Current study investigates the relation between infant aggressive behavior, regulation capacity and negative affect, and maternal sensitivity and intrusiveness. The aim of the study was to identify indicators of early infant aggression. 85 Mothers (M = 24.67 years, SD = 2.10) filled in questionnaires concerning infant aggressive behavior and temperament of their 20-month-old infant (M = 19.92 months, SD = 0.76, 54 % boys). Maternal behavior was observed during a Teaching Task. Regression and mediation analyses where conducted. Current study confirms maternal sensitivity and negative affect as predictors of infant aggressive behavior. For infant regulation capacity and intrusive parenting of the mother no predictive value was found. Maternal parenting skills did not mediate the association between infant temperament and aggression. The results suggest that infant negative affect is an important factor in the development of infant aggression and should be involved in future prevention and intervention programs together with stimulating mothers’ sensitive parenting skills.Show less
Approximately 10 to 15% of new mothers experience postpartum depression. Different studies have reported that the behavior of mothers with a postpartum depression towards their child is different...Show moreApproximately 10 to 15% of new mothers experience postpartum depression. Different studies have reported that the behavior of mothers with a postpartum depression towards their child is different from the behavior of mothers without depressive symptoms. The aberrant behavior of mothers with a postpartum depression can lead to negative outcomes for their child in the field of social, emotional, cognitive and physical development. The purpose of this study was to gain more information about the behavior of mothers with depressive symptoms towards their child. The ‘Still Face Procedure’ has been used to examine whether depressive symptoms of mothers in the postpartum period influence the amount of sensitive and intrusive behavior towards their child and positive interaction with their child during a neutral situation (‘Play episode’) and a more stressful situation (‘Reunion episode’). Furthermore, this study examined if mothers with depressive symptoms behaved differently during the ‘Play episode’ compared to the ‘Reunion episode’. Participants were 143 mothers from 17 to 25 years old recruited for a bigger research of Leiden University: ‘Een Goed Begin’. ‘Een Goed Begin’ examines parenting skills and child development using five separate measurements during the period from pregnancy until the child is two and a half years old. When the children were six months old, the ‘Still Face Procedure’ was carried out. The amount of depressive symptoms has been examined at the same time with the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-II-NL). Against expectations, mothers with depressive symptoms did not show less sensitivity, more intrusiveness or less positive interaction than mothers without depressive symptoms in both episodes. Mothers with depressive symptoms showed significantly more positive interaction during the ‘Play episode’ than during the ‘Reunion episode’, but for sensitivity and intrusiveness no significant differences were found. Probably more significant differences will be found with a clinical depressed group of participants.Show less
Het huidige onderzoek maakte deel uit van ‘Een Goed Begin’, een longitudinaal onderzoek van Universiteit Leiden. In dit onderzoek is aan de hand van het Still-Face Paradigma onderzocht of baby’s...Show moreHet huidige onderzoek maakte deel uit van ‘Een Goed Begin’, een longitudinaal onderzoek van Universiteit Leiden. In dit onderzoek is aan de hand van het Still-Face Paradigma onderzocht of baby’s van 6 maanden oud over reactieve (‘positieve affectie’, ‘negatieve affectie’) en zelfregulerende vaardigheden (‘gaze’, ‘zelf-kalmerend gedrag’, ‘reiken/wurmen’) beschikken. Daarnaast is er onderzocht of baby’s van sensitieve moeders een betere zelfregulatie hebben dan baby’s van matig sensitieve moeders. Ook is de invloed van emotieregulatie van de moeder op de zelfregulatie van de baby onderzocht. 151 moeders die hun eerste baby verwachtten deden mee aan het onderzoek. Tijdens de zwangerschap is de DERS afgenomen. De drie opeenvolgende fasen van het SFP zijn opgenomen op camera waarna reactiviteit/zelfregulatie van de baby en sensitiviteit van de moeder door getrainde codeurs gecodeerd is. Uit de resultaten bleken baby’ s van 6 maanden tussen de verschillende episodes van het SFP significante verschillen te vertonen voor bijna alle componenten van reactiviteit/zelfregulatie. Alleen ‘zelf-kalmerend gedrag’ bleek niet significant. Het ‘still-face effect’, recovery effect’ en ‘carry-over effect’ waren aanwezig. Baby’s van sensitieve moeders tonen significant minder ‘positieve affectie’ en ‘gaze’ in de still-face’ episode. Emotieregulatie van de moeder bleek geen significante invloed te hebben op de reactiviteit/zelfregulatie van de baby. Het huidige onderzoek geeft aan dat baby’s van 6 maanden al zelfregulerende vaardigheden hebben. Er zal echter meer onderzoek moeten komen naar welke factoren van invloed zijn, en of de zelfregulatie effectief is.Show less
This study has examined the influence of sensitivity of the mother and self-regulation of the child on a) the physiological stress reactivity of the child and b) the temperamental reactivity of the...Show moreThis study has examined the influence of sensitivity of the mother and self-regulation of the child on a) the physiological stress reactivity of the child and b) the temperamental reactivity of the child. The goal of this research was to gain more understanding of the factors that influence stress reactivity. Method: The sample of the research consisted of 175 mothers and their offspring. The children were examined at the age of 12 months. The Lab TAB Robot task was used to measure the temperamental reactivity and self-regulation of the child and the Still Face Paradigm (SFP) measured sensitivity of the mother. Physiological stress reactivity of the child was measured using VU-AMS. Results: This research showed a significant difference between temperamental reactivity and sensitivity of the mother. There were no further significant differences. Discussion: Children of mothers who were more sensitive, had a higher temperamental reactivity, than children of mothers who were less sensitive.Show less
Research master thesis | Developmental Psychopathology in Education and Child Studies (research) (MSc)
open access
2019-07-19T00:00:00Z
Problems with emotion regulation in childhood are related to negative child outcomes later in life, such as behavior problems. Because parents play an essential role by assisting their infant to...Show moreProblems with emotion regulation in childhood are related to negative child outcomes later in life, such as behavior problems. Because parents play an essential role by assisting their infant to develop the ability to regulate their emotions, the purpose of this study was to gain deeper understanding of the relation between maternal behavior and infants’ behavioral and physiological emotional reactivity and emotion regulation. 66 mother-infant dyads participated in two stress paradigms: the still-face paradigm was conducted at 6 months of age and the child was exposed to the robot paradigm at 12 months of age. During the stress paradigms infants’ behavioral reactivity, self-soothing behavior, heart rate and respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) were examined. Maternal sensitivity and maternal intrusiveness were observed during a free play task at the 6-month appointment. Overall, the infants showed behavioral and physiological arousal and regulation during stress. Although no effect of maternal intrusiveness was found, the 6-month-old infants of mothers judged as more sensitive showed more emotional reactivity, indicated by a greater increase in negative affect and heart rate than infants of less sensitive mothers. These infants also showed more physiological regulation, indicated by a greater decrease in RSA during stress than infants of less sensitive mothers. The stability of emotional reactivity and emotion regulation between 6 and 12 months was low: only the difference in RSA from stress to recovery was modestly stable. It is concluded that maternal behavior has an effect on the development of infants’ emotional reactivity and emotion regulation Future studies should further investigate the environmental characteristics influencing the development of emotion regulation in children using longitudinal designs.Show less
Research master thesis | Developmental Psychopathology in Education and Child Studies (research) (MSc)
open access
2018-09-25T00:00:00Z
The present study was the first to investigate the association between mothers’ ability to reflect upon the relationship with her (unborn) infant during pregnancy and maternal and infant behavior...Show moreThe present study was the first to investigate the association between mothers’ ability to reflect upon the relationship with her (unborn) infant during pregnancy and maternal and infant behavior during the Still-Face Paradigm (SFP). The sample consisted of 52 mother-infant dyads, from both high (HR, N = 22)- and low (LR, N = 29) risk backgrounds, as defined by the presence/absence of unemployment, poverty or financial problems, housing problems, limited or instable social support network, being single or having changing partners, (subclinical) psychiatric problems (such as depression, anxiety, borderline, aggression), or substance abuse (smoking, alcohol, or drugs). High-risk (HR)-mothers had lower levels of reflective functioning than LR-mothers and showed less sensitive and more intrusive behavior in interaction with their infants. Infants from high risk backgrounds showed more negative affect during play and less gaze towards mother during the still-face episode of the SFP. Reflective functioning during pregnancy predicted maternal sensitive and intrusive behavior during play, but only for LR-mothers. In general, maternal reflective functioning predicted infant display of minimal positive affect during the still-face episode, an association that was not mediated by maternal behavior during the SFP. These results indicate that mothers’ reflective abilities predict later maternal sensitive and intrusive behavior, and even some infant behavior independently from maternal behavior. Future studies should further clarify the role of maternal reflective capacities in the development of children’s emotion regulation abilities, and its potential role in prenatal coaching and interventions.Show less
Empirical evidence shows that maternal sensitivity and child attachment are universal phenomena and cross-cultural differences in its quality have been examined extensively. However, less is known...Show moreEmpirical evidence shows that maternal sensitivity and child attachment are universal phenomena and cross-cultural differences in its quality have been examined extensively. However, less is known about cultural differences or similarities in maternal beliefs about sensitive parenting. The current study tested the hypothesis that mothers from Zambia, Moroccan immigrant mothers in the Netherlands and Dutch mothers generally have similar beliefs about sensitive parenting. The total sample consisted of 75 mothers with at least one child between 6 months and 6 years old. Maternal views about an ideal mother assessed with the Maternal Behavior Q-Sort (Pederson, Moran, & Bento, 1999) showed high agreement between the groups of mothers. In addition, in all groups of mothers the sensitivity beliefs showed strong overlap with the notion of a highly sensitive mother as described by experts in the field of child and family studies. These findings suggest that sensitive parenting is seen as ideal across cultural and ethnic groups, which implies that it might be possible to use the same interventions and measurements for maternal sensitivity in different ethnic and cultural contexts.Show less