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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Developmental Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1588433
This article is part of the Research TopicThe Power of Relationships in Human Development: From Prenatal Bonding to Attachment Across the LifespanView all articles
Psychological and Social Factors Influencing Mother-Child Bonding in the First Year After Birth: A Model for Promoting Infant and Maternal Well-Being
Provisionally accepted- 1Department of Education Sciences, University of Catania, Catania, Italy
- 2Université de Bretagne Occidentale, Brest, Brittany, France
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This study aimed to examine how maternal mental health, sleep quality, and social support influence mother-infant bonding during the first year after childbirth. A total of 1495 mothers participated by completing standardized questionnaires that assessed the quality of bonding with their infants, experiences of childbirth-related post-traumatic stress, symptoms of postpartum depression, sleep disturbances, and levels of social support. The results indicated that 49.6% of mothers experienced childbirth-related post-traumatic stress, 32.2% reported symptoms of postpartum depression, and 50.7% experienced sleep disturbances. Regression analysis showed that postpartum depression, poor sleep quality, older maternal age, emergency cesarean delivery, and low levels of social and partner support hurt the quality of the mother-infant bond. Depressive symptoms emerged as the strongest negative predictor, whereas adequate social and partner support positively influenced bonding. These findings highlight the need for early screening and interventions aimed at improving maternal mental health and social support to promote positive mother-infant bonding and healthy child development.
Keywords: Bonding, Postpartum, Child Development, Maternal Mental Health, social support
Received: 05 Mar 2025; Accepted: 14 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 La Rosa, Alparone and COMMODARI. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Valentina Lucia La Rosa, Department of Education Sciences, University of Catania, Catania, Italy
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