Impact Of Maternal Reflective Functioning And Maternal Sensitivity On Infant Social Withdrawal

Early mother-infant relationship is of long-term significance for the physical and mental health of infants.Infants suffering from early interactions with mothers may show social withdrawal behaviors in 2 months to protect themselves,which is an early warning signal expressing as lacking of positive behavior(such as eye contact,smile,whisper)or negative behavior(such as resistance,crying).Highly sensitive mothers can read the baby's signals in a timely manner,give appropriate feedback,support,accompany,or exit the interaction properly.These sensitive parenting behaviors depend on good parental reflective functioning.The lack of sufficient parental reflective functioning makes it difficult for mothers to understand the psychological state behind their children's behavior,and it is easy to be overwhelmed by their own emotions in mother-child interactions and to maliciously attribute their children.Previous studies have focused on the internalized and externalized problems and their influencing factors during childhood,while abnormal behaviors in infancy are often ignored.There are few domestic studies on infant social withdrawal,and the underlying mechanisms and developments over time are unclear.In addition,existing researches on infant social withdrawal have always focused on maternal depression or other risk factors in the parenting environment,few studies have focused on protective factors.Therefore,this study focused on the effects of maternal reflective functioning and sensitivity on infant social withdrawal,and attempted to explain the causal relationship between maternal reflective functioning,maternal sensitivity and infant social withdrawal on the basis of longitudinal tracing.In study 1,we used interactive observations and questionnaires to recruit 107 pairs of 2-24month-old infants and their mothers as valid subjects.Assess infant social withdrawal by using the Alarm Distress Baby Scale(ADBB)by photographing infant-pediatrician interactions in hospitals or infant-mother interactions in the home.Assess maternal sensitivity by using the Ainsworth Maternal Sensitivity Scales by photographing the free mother-infant interactions in hospital maternity rooms or in the home.The self-compiled sociodemographic information and parenting questionnaire and parental mentalization questionnaire were used to assess demographic risk factors and maternal reflective functioning,to explore the cross-sectional relationship between infant social withdrawal behavior and maternal reflective functioning and maternal sensitivity.Study 2 which based on Study 1 conducted two longitudinal follow-ups of mothers and infants who agreed to continue observation every 3 months,and we finally obtained 42 valid data for 2-24 month old infants and their mothers.Consistent with the observation methods carried out by each participant in Study 1,tracking infant social withdrawal,maternal sensitivity,and maternal reflective functioning,to explore the changes over time,and analyze the longitudinal relationship through cross-lag regression analysis of infant social withdrawal,maternal sensitivity,and maternal reflective functioning.The results obtained show that:(1)After controlling whether the baby is born full term,the mother's working status,the baby's gender,and whether the primary caregiver is the mother,the refuse-defense dimension of maternal reflective functioning cannot directly predict the infant social withdrawal,maternal sensitivity plays a full mediating role.(2)In the longitudinal data,maternal sensitivity has remained relatively stable.Infant social withdrawal and the three dimensions of maternal pre-mentalization(distorted mentalization,refuse and defense,and concrete mentalization)has a tendency to decline over time.(3)After controlling whether the baby is born full term,the cross-lag regression model of the maternal reflective functioning,maternal sensitivity and infant social withdrawal fit well.The maternal reflective functioning and sensitivity predict infant social withdrawal negatively,but infant social withdrawal had no prediction of maternal reflective functioning and sensitivity.(4)Unlike the full mediation in cross-sectional data,maternal sensitivity in T2 plays a partial mediating role between maternal refuse-defense dimension of maternal reflective functioning in T1 and infant social withdrawal in T3,suggesting that mother's reflective functioning may have a lagging effect on infant social withdrawal.