Pregnancy and Prenatal Development

A Psychosocial Analysis

Free Associate: Pregnancy

• What do parents-to-be need for them and the fetus to thrive?

• Influences on the quality of the pregnancy period-social support, relationship strength, psychosocial stressors, cultural context, etc.

• Influences on the health of the fetus, e.g. health behavior of parents, toxins in environment, etc.

• What are some populations of parents-to-be that are at risk of problems with pregnancy?

What are some potential problems?

• Low birth weight

• Pre-term birth

• Substance use---developmental delay

• Poor nutrition

• Toxic environment---developmental delay

Prevention, Intervention or Treatment?

Primary prevention: Efforts targeting a broad group, not necessarily at risk.

Secondary prevention: Efforts targeting a particular risk group.

Tertiary prevention: Efforts targeting people with the problem intended to reduce relapse or mitigate the effects of the problem.

Small Groups: A Psychosocial Analysis of Pregnancy

• Choose a population of parents to be.• Create a client in this population, including

– Age– Developmental tasks that will help or hurt her during

this experience– Radius of significant relationships– Characteristics of the central process– Psychosocial crises and coping behaviors that help or

hinder her as she copes

• Given your psychosocial analysis, what services would be helpful to this parent-to-be?

Debrief…

• Who has an example of a developmental task that interacts with pregnancy in a problematic way?

• In what way did the radius of sig. relationships support or complicate the experience?

• What links did you make between an earlier psychosocial crisis and the pregnancy experience? Between coping behaviors and the pregnancy experience?

• Other observations?

Intervention-Nurse Family Partnerships

• 25 years of research

• Based on theory– Systems theory/Human Ecology– Attachment theory– Self-efficacy theory

• Belief that a behavior will lead to an outcome• Belief one can accomplish the behavior

Handout- “The Nurse Family Partnership: An Evidence-Based Preventive Intervention”

• Focus areas of intervention– Prenatal health-related behavior-nutrition,

smoking, drinking, using• Low birth weight• Preterm• Complications

– Sensitive and Competent Care of the child

– Early parental Life course

What are they preventing/promoting?

• Birth outcomes

• Child Neurodevelopmental Impairment

• Later Parental Life Course

Effectiveness?

• 25% fewer cigarettes smoked• 75% fewer preterm deliveries• 13 oz increase in birth rate (14-16 y/o moms)• Less punishing/restricting• More appropriate play materials• Improvement in home environment• 80% fewer verified cases of abuse/neglect• 32% fewer emergency room visits

For Response Paper

• Give a brief description of your group work-your target group, what services would be helpful, etc.

• Explain briefly each of the six basic concepts of psychosocial theory, using your or another group’s example.