Perinatal Clinical Psychology: Parent-Child Interaction in Primary Care

Perinatal clinical psychology deals with infant mental development, primary parent-child relationships, and problems related to nurturing and parenting activities of the woman and the couple during the prenatal and neonatal period. Its aims are promoting positive influences and preventing risk elements for the child’s development and for the parents raising the child, thus providing support to primary relationships. Perinatal clinical psychology studies intra-psychic, interpersonal, and transgenerational mental processes. In this paper, we present a short synthesis of the origin and development over time of the main concepts that are used in perinatal clinical psychology interventions and research.