This is a two-part article. Part One of this article describes four stages of cognition and their anthropological equivalents to better understand both the resistance to and the acceptance of pre- and perinatal psychology and other ways of thinking about birth. Part Two will appear in the Winter 2019 issue.
This article discusses a 44-item questionnaire developed to investigate the axes along which maternal models are organized. It was predicted that two primary axes, warmth and invasiveness, would be identified, and questionnaire data were collected from mothers in Great Britain and Hungary. The predicted axes were confirmed and a 14-item short-form questionnaire, with good psychometric properties, was derived.
This paper reports the successful validation of MORS-SF against other measures in both the original Hungarian and British samples and in new samples in both countries, showing predicted relationships with other measures in the original and the independent validation datasets. It is concluded that this is a valid tool, with uses in research and health practice.
The promotion of perinatal mental health and the provision of effective, evidence-based psychological interventions has become a priority within the UK. Increased awareness of the impact of poor maternal mental health and improved financial investment has led to the rapid expansion of perinatal community mental health services.
This study explored the experiences of women who self-identify with the term “postnatal depression” and have accessed NHS services for treatment. This research gives a voice to these women and hopes to better understand how to work psychologically with them.
Ways of Knowing about Birth is a compilation of Robbie Davis-Floyd’s writings spanning thirty years. The selections in this volume offer valuable insights for many readers, from students of midwifery, anthropology and women’s studies, to practicing midwives and obstetricians, to women who are seeking to inform themselves about their own childbirth care options.
Adults in the U.S., from a university or Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk), read a vignette about a woman experiencing a miscarriage and answered questions about reactions to the vignette, predictions about the subject’s future, demographics, knowledge of miscarriage, belief in a just world, locus of control, and liking of children.