Change in Maternal Behavior during the Baby's First Year of Life

Author(s): Susan Crockenberg and Karen McCluskey

Source: Child Development , Jun., 1986, Vol. 57, No. 3 (Jun., 1986), pp. 746-753
Published by: Wiley on behalf of the Society for Research in Child Development

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/1130351

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Change in Maternal Behavior during the
Baby's First Year of Life

Susan Crockenberg and Karen McCluskey

University of California, Davis

CROCKENBERG, SUSAN, and MCCLUSKEY, KAREN. Change in Maternal Behavior during the Baby's
First Year of Life. CHILD DEVELOPMENT, 1986, 57, 746-753. The influence of maternal attitudes,
social support, and infant irritability on maternal behavior was assessed. Early maternal behavior did
not predict later maternal behavior. Change in maternal behavior was associated with the mother's
social support and with an interaction between her initial attitudes about responsiveness and her
baby's irritability. Mothers with good social support were more sensitive toward their babies during
reunion episodes of the Strange Situation than mothers with poor support. Mothers with unrespon-
sive attitudes and irritable babies were the most insensitive to their babies in that setting. Crying
during separation also predicted maternal sensitivity during reunion. It was found, however, that
this infant behavior was associated with early maternal unresponsiveness rather than with neonatal
irritability. Implications of change in maternal behavior for the child's attachment security are
discussed.

Several investigators have considered size,

the considerable change in maternal behav-
extent to which mothers are consistently ior
sen-must also be occurring.
sitive and responsive to their babies' needs
There is little information on the circum-
throughout the first year of life. In general,
stances under which mothers change the way
the correlations are significantly different
they respond to and interact with their chil-
than zero, but not high. Bell and Ainsworth
dren. It is reasonable to expect, however, that
(1972) reported significant stability in mater-
factors that influence parenting in the first
nal responsiveness to infant crying between 3
place will contribute to changes in maternal
and 12 months. Heinicke, Diskin, Ramsey-
behavior as well. Thus, changes within the
Klee, and Given (1983) identified parent re-
child, or changes in the family's social con-
sponsiveness to infant need at 6 months as the
text, should be accompanied by changes in
best predictor of parents' responsiveness to
parents attitudes and/or behavior.
infant need at 12 months. Belsky, Taylor, and
Rovine (1984) reported stability during theAmong factors that affect parenting, there
first year in "reciprocal interaction," a vari-
is evidence that high stress, low support, or
able that subsequently distinguished securely
some combination thereof may adversely af-
attached and resistant babies (Belsky, Rovine,
fect maternal behavior, especially when the
& Taylor, 1984); however, stability datamother-child
for pair is already "at risk" by virtue
mothers' responsiveness to infant distress,of athe mother's or the baby's characteristics
maternal characteristic that distinguished (Crnic,
se- Greenberg, Ragozin, Robinson, &
cure from both avoidant and resistant babies,
Basham, 1983; Crockenberg, in press-a).
were not reported. Other investigators haveMoreover, family stress and social support
also reported significant associations between
have been linked to both the security of the
maternal attitudes and responsive maternal baby's attachment and to changes in attach-
behavior (Crockenberg & Smith, 1982; Moss, ment over time, and we may speculate that
1967; Tulkin & Cohler, 1973). Given that all associations are mediated in part by
these
these correlations are modest to moderate changes
in in the mother's behavior (Crocken-

This research was funded by the Agricultural Experiment Station, University of California,
Davis. Some of the data included in this paper have been analyzed previously (Crockenberg, 1981;
Crockenberg & Smith, 1982), but the additional measures (of infant crying during separation and 12-
month maternal sensitivity) allow us to address issues not previously considered using this data set.
The findings of that earlier analysis are in no way undermined by the present analysis. Thanks are
extended to Susan Walter for her contribution to the development of procedures for coding maternal
behavior in the Strange Situation, and to Curt Acredolo for his comments on this paper and for his
help with data analysis. Requests for reprints should be sent to Susan Crockenberg, Department of
Applied Behavioral Sciences, University of California, Davis, CA 95616.

[Child Development, 1986, 57, 746-753. ? 1986 by the Society for Research in Child Development, Inc.
All rights reserved. 0009-3920/86/5703-0024$01.00]

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 Crockenberg and McCluskey 747

berg, 1981; Thompson, Lamb, & Estes, 1982; continuing through the first year of the child's
Vaughn, Egeland, Sroufe, & Waters, 1979). life. Readers are referred to Crockenberg
(1981) for additional information on subjects
It may also be that parents alter their be-
and procedures.
havior in response to the cumulative impact
of their child's characteristics. Moss (1967), Procedures
and more recently Bates (in press), have sug- Prenatal Maternal Questionnaire.-A
gested that an irritable infant temperament34-item questionnaire was developed to as-
may come to elicit unresponsive or insensi- sess a variety of maternal attitudes, beliefs,
tive caregiving only after a period of time. and expectations (Smith, 1978). The re-
Initially, temperament may have either a sponses of 95 pregnant or recently delivered
negligible effect on maternal behavior, or, women (including the 48 study participants)
alternately, the greater expressed needs of thewere subjected to a principal components fac-
irritable baby may elicit greater maternal in- tor analysis with a quartimax rotation. Of the
volvement and responsiveness (Crockenberg, four major factors that emerged, two were
in press-b). Over time, however, the effort clearly centered around responsiveness (re-
involved in caring for an irritable baby may sponsiveness to crying and responsiveness to
undermine the mother's capacity to remain night crying), and one was clearly a flexibility
responsive. If this occurs, we would expect factor. The fourth was uninterpretable. Factor
positive correlations between irritability and scores were computed by summing the
maternal responsiveness early in the first yearweighted standard scores of the three or four
of life but negative correlations as the child items having the highest loadings on each
gets older. of the three interpretable factors. The three
factor scores were then summed to create
The association between the baby's ir-
the general index of prenatal maternal
ritability and the mother's behavior may also
responsiveness.
depend on some third variable, such as the
mother's attitudes or characteristics, or the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale
balance of stress and support in her life, a (NBAS).-Assessments were made in the in-
possibility implied in Sameroff's (1975) trans- fants' homes on the fifth and tenth days fol-
actional model and Bronfenbrenner's (1979) lowing birth. Peak of excitement, rapidity of
ecological model of development. Both buildup, and irritability items were combined
Belsky (1984) and Lerner and Lerner (1983)to form the neonatal irritability measure
predict that the same temperamental attributeidentified by Kaye (1978). Scores were then
will be associated with either negative oraveraged across the two administrations.
positive parent-child interactions, depending
on the parents' orientation to that attribute. Mother-infant observations.-Approx-
Hence, the mother of an irritable baby might imately 31/2 hours of observation were made
in the children's homes when they were 3
provide more responsive caregiving if her
months old. A 10-sec-observe, 10-sec-record
personal beliefs predispose her to view the
time-sampling schedule was used, with both
irritability as an indication of the baby's spe-
mother and infant behavior recorded in each
cial need rather than as evidence of spoiling
interval. This procedure yielded a measure of
or of her own incompetence.
3-month maternal responsiveness (MR): the
At issue in this study are the determi-average number of seconds required for a
nants of change in maternal responsiveness/mother to respond to her infant's distress sig-
sensitivity over the course of the infant's firstnal (subtracted from 100 to invert the scale).
year of life. The potential influence of mater-The average time to respond was 22.24 sec
nal attitudes, social support, and infant irrita-(SD = 30.10).
bility on maternal behavior (both main effects Social support interview.-At the 3-
and interactions) are assessed. More specif-month observation, mothers were inter-
ically, we will investigate whether, and underviewed concerning social support and stress
what conditions, mothers of irritable infants,they experienced since the birth of their
in contrast to mothers of less irritable babies,
babies. A measure of social support was com-
become less responsive/sensitive over time. puted by subtracting the number of stresses
from the combined support ratings; individ-
Method ual scores ranged from -4 to +3.
Subjects The Strange Situation.-Each infant and
Forty-six Caucasian and two Asian- mother were seen in the Ainsworth and
American mothers and infants participated in
Wittig (1969) Strange Situation near the in-
the study, beginning during pregnancy and
fant's first birthday. Each observation was

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 Crockenberg and McCluskey 749

videotaped, and all ratings were based on maternal sensitivity (MS) ratings was not
those records. significant, r(47) = .16.

A four-point rating scale of 12-month ma- To investigate the possibility that this
lack of association was a function of the differ-
ternal sensitivity (MS) was developed based
on the four facets of maternal responsivenessence in the measures of maternal behavior at
the two ages, an index of the specific attribute
and sensitivity (awareness of signals, accurate
identification, an appropriate response, andofa responsiveness to crying was derived from
prompt response) identified by Ainsworth, the 12-month data. The 32 mothers whose
babies cried during separations were divided
Bell, and Stayton (1974). Descriptions of each
scale point are presented in Table 1. into two groups on the basis of whether or not
they responded to their babies' crying: (1)
Ratings were made by a clinical psychol-
within eight 15-sec intervals, or (2) after more
ogy graduate student unfamiliar with the at-
than eight such intervals-those who delayed
tachment coding procedures and with noeven after they were specifically invited by
prior information on the families. For eachthe investigator to return to their babies. The
mother, both reunion episodes were scored
two groups were then compared to determine
using these scales. Interrater reliability be-
whether the 22 mothers who delayed re-
tween the "blind" assistant and the principal
sponding to their crying babies had taken
investigator was established on 28 of thelonger to respond to crying during the 3-
tapes. Reliability was calculated by dividing
month observations than had the 10 mothers
the agreements by the sum of agreements who responded more quickly to their babies'
plus disagreements separately by whether the
crying at 12 months. A chi-square analysis re-
"blind" rater felt certain (80%) or uncertain
vealed no significant association between ma-
(20%) of her rating. Mean interrater agree-
ternal responsiveness to crying at 3 and at 12
ment for "certain" ratings was .83, and for
months. From this finding we may infer that
"uncertain" ratings was .50. To maintain a
the lack of predictability between 3- and 12-
high standard of accuracy in rating the re-
month maternal behavior probably reflects
maining 20 mothers, the rater again indicated
real change and is not simply an artifact of the
when she was uncertain (5% of the 40 epi- different measures.
sodes), and these episodes were double-rated.
All disagreements were discussed until the Predictors of Change in Maternal
two raters reached agreement. Examination of Responsiveness/Sensitivity between 3 and
all disagreements indicated only two differ- 12 Months
ences of more than one step, and both of those To identify variables associated with
occurred in the sensitivity ratings of a single change in maternal behavior between 3 and
mother-infant pair. Maternal sensitivity was 12 months, an analysis of partial variance (Co-
expressed as the average sensitivity rating over hen & Cohen, 1975) was employed. Maternal
both reunion episodes (M = 2.98, SD = .92). responsiveness at 3 months was partialed
from the equation first to eliminate predict-
Infant crying during separation (episodes ability associated with stability of maternal
4 and 7 of the Strange Situation) was rated behavior. Additional variables were then
using procedures suggested by Ainsworth, entered in the following order: prenatal
Blehar, Waters, and Wall (1978) and repre- maternal responsiveness, neonatal irritabil-
sents the only Strange Situation infant vari- ity, social support, and separation crying. In-
able included in subsequent analyses. For spection of the zero-order correlations indi-
ethical reasons, we reminded mothers by 11/2 cated that prenatal responsiveness and social
min into the separation that they could returnsupport significantly predicted MS only in the
to their infants. Some mothers did so, therebygroup of more irritable babies. Thus, to test
confounding the meaning of duration of sep-the hypothesis that neonatal irritability in-
aration crying beyond a certain point. For teracted with prenatal maternal attitudes and/
purposes of these analyses, therefore, separa-or social support to predict maternal sensitiv-
tion crying was artificially bounded at noity at age 1 year, two interactions were
more than eight 15-sec intervals for each sep-entered on the last step of the equation. The
aration episode. results are reported in Table 2.

Results Prenatal responsive attitudes, social sup-

port, and 12-month separation crying inde-
Predictability of Maternal Behavior frompendently
3 predicted 12-month maternal be-
Months to 12 Months havior. Each variable predicted MS both at
The correlation between 3-month mater- entry and after all other main effect variables
nal responsiveness (MR) and the 12-month were partialed out. In addition, a responsive

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750 Child Development

TABLE 2

PREDICTORS OF MATERNAL SENSITIVITY IN THE REUNION EPISODES OF THE STRANGE SITUATION

Predictors r pr df F

3-month responsiveness ................................ .16 ... 1,46 1.26

Prenatal responsive attitude............................ ..40 .37 1,45 7.09**
Neonatal irritability ................................... -.17 -.25 1,44 2.85+
Social support......................................... ..32 .30 1,43 4.28*
12-month separation crying ............................. -.53 -.54 1,42 17.64****
Prenatal responsive attitude x neonatal irritability........ ... -.42 1,41 8.88***
Social support x neonatal irritability .................... ... -.28 1,41 3.46+

NOTE.-Significance levels are based on the F value for that variable at entry.
+ p < .10.
* p < .05.
** p < .025.
*** p < .005.
**** p < .001.

ity-insensitivity dimension had been defined

prenatal maternal attitude x neonatal irrita-
bility interaction significantly predicted MS.
(see Table 1). In view of the strength of that
The Johnson-Neyman technique used to in- association, however, it is worth asking about
terpret the interaction revealed that, for in-
the predictors of crying during separation. Is
it associated with early infant irritability, with
fants above the mean in irritability, the associ-
ation between prenatal maternal attitude and some characteristic of the mother, or with
MS was represented by a significantly posi- some interaction thereof?
tive slope, p < .05, whereas for infants below
To explore this question, zero-order cor-
the mean in irritability the slope was negligi-
relations between potential predictors and
ble. High irritability in conjunction with low
separation crying were examined: (1) for the
prenatal responsiveness was associated with
entire sample, and (2) for two subgroups of
low maternal sensitivity at 12 months.
infants, those "high" (above the median in
Two additional pieces of evidence areneonatal irritability) and "low" (below the
consistent with the hypothesis that certain median in neonatal irritability). The only
mothers become less responsive to irritable significant predictor of separation crying for
babies over time. (1) A post hoc comparison the whole sample was 3-month MR: babies
of the zero-order correlations of neonatal ir- whose mothers had responded less quickly to
ritability with 3-month MR and with 12- their crying at 3 months cried longer during
month MS revealed that the negative correla- separation in the Strange Situation at 12
tion between the latter, though not months, r(47) = .30, p < .05. Examination of
significant, r(47) = -.17, differed signifi- the correlations for the subgroups revealed
cantly (p < .05) from the positive correlation strong associations between 3-month MR,
between irritability and MR, r(47) = .29, p prenatal
< maternal responsiveness, and separa-
.05. Mothers of more irritable neonates were tion crying only in the group of less-irritable
less sensitive to their infants at 12 months babies, r = -.50, p < .025, an r = -.54, p <
than at 3 months. (2) At 3 months, an interac- .01, respectively. In the high-irritable group,
tion between prenatal responsive attitude and there were no significant predictors of separa-
neonatal irritability predicted maternal re- tion crying, and the zero-order correlations
sponsiveness to crying, F(1,48) = 9.06, p < between the responsiveness variables and
.005, but, in contrast to the 12-month data, it separation crying differed significantly from
was the mothers with a combination of unre- the correlations between those variables in
sponsive attitudes and less irritable infants the low-irritable group, Fisher's Z = 2.37, p <
who were particularly unresponsive. .01, and - 1.88, p < .05, respectively.
Predictors of Separation Crying
The significant association between sep- Discussion
aration crying and maternal sensitivity in the
Strange Situation may reflect the fact that a During the first year of life, many
mother whose baby continues to cry during mothers change in their responsiveness to
reunion has a better chance of being rated as their babies' cues, and this change is associ-
"insensitive" given the way that the sensitiv- ated in a complex way with the characteristics

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 Crockenberg and McCluskey 751

of the baby, the mother, and their social little stability in maternal behavior between 3
environment. and 12 months, and (2) the artificial bound-
aries placed on separation crying substantially
Mothers who report good social support
reduced variation in that variable associated
during their child's infancy are more sensitive
with differences in the amount of time
toward their babies at age 1 year during re-
mothers let their babies cry during separation.
union episodes of the Strange Situation. That
It seems likely, therefore, that the observed
this association is apparent after partialing
association reflects the long-term impact of
gives us confidence that it is not an artifact of
early caregiving on infant behavior.
prenatal maternal attitudes or neonatal char-
acteristics. However, consistent with an ear- In contrast to other research on maternal
lier report (Crockenberg, 1981), zero-order behavior during infancy, the focus of this
correlations indicate that this association is study is change in maternal behavior over the
significant only for more irritable babies. course of the baby's first year of life. Also in
contrast to those studies, the amount of
Change in maternal behavior is associ-
change in maternal behavior found in this
ated also with the infant's irritability in con-
junction with the mother's prebirth attitudes. study was relatively large, as indicated by the
Unresponsive maternal attitudes are associ- small and nonsignificant correlation between
maternal behavior at 3 and 12 months. What
ated with maternal insensitivity at 12 months
only for babies identified as irritable during might account for this discrepancy? First, it is
possible that differences in the nature of the
the neonatal period. This finding is consistent
with the view that the impact of infant temp- measures used to assess maternal respon-
erament on caregiving depends on other char- siveness/sensitivity in the present study con-
acteristics of the caregiver, as Belsky (1984) tribute to the lower predictability of maternal
behavior between 3- and 12-month maternal
and Lerner and Lemer (1983) have sug-
gested. However, the association between ir- behavior. Second, the degree of "true" stabil-
ritability and insensitivity also appears to ity in maternal behavior may be quite small.
evolve as the mother-child relationship pro- Given the relatively small samples (ranging in
gresses over the course of the baby's first year. size from 26 to 52 mothers and babies) em-
At 3 months, the statistical interaction was ex-ployed in this and other studies (Bell & Ains-
worth, 1972; Belsky, Taylor, & Rovine, 1984;
actly the reverse: unresponsive attitudes were
associated with unresponsive behavior onlyHeinicke et al., 1983), the probability of de-
for less-irritable babies. The additional tecting a significant nonzero correlation may
finding-that at 3 months, mothers of irritable be no better than 50-50. Third, the stability in
babies responded significantly more quickly maternal behavior over time may vary with
than did mothers of less irritable babies when the composition of the sample. In the present
sample,
their babies cried-suggests that in the first 3 for example, decreases in respon-
months the baby's characteristics may siveness
have a were apparent primarily for mothers
demand effect on maternal behavior that of par-
irritable babies. We might expect, there-
fore,
tially obscures differences associated with thethat the more irritable babies in a sam-
attitude mothers bring to the situation.ple,
By the
12 less continuity in maternal respon-
months, this responsiveness to irritable siveness we would see. It is likely that there
were more irritable babies included in this
babies is no longer apparent, and mothers of
irritable babies behave in a manner morestudy
con- than is typical because of the proce-
gruent with their prenatal attitudes. dures used to select subjects. Parents of
babies with high ratings on the first Brazelton
Three-month maternal behavior, and not
exam were more likely (on an order of 5 to 1)
infant irritability, predicted 12-month crying
to cancel our second visit and withdraw from
during separation. Reminiscent of Bell and
the study. We compensated for this by "re-
Ainsworth's (1972) findings, mothers who re-
cruiting" matched babies to fill their places.
sponded more slowly when their babies cried
For every lost baby with an initial irritability
at 3 months had babies who cried longer dur-
score of 6.00 or greater, we located a baby
ing the Strange Situation separation with
at 12a comparable score. We did the same for
months. As we would expect, however, less given
irritable babies. The result should be a
the decline in maternal sensitivity to irritable
more representative sample of infant tem-
babies over time, early unresponsiveness pre-
peramental characteristics than would other-
dicted later crying only for the less-irritable
wise have been obtained.
babies. Moreover, the association between 3-
month maternal behavior and 12-month sep- In sum, while the degree of stability in
aration crying cannot be attributed to stability
maternal behavior remains an issue, there is
in maternal behavior over time: (1) There was to believe that considerable change in
reason

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752 Child Development

maternal behavior commonly associated with research linking support to security of attach-
security of attachment occurs during the ment, suggests that providing support to
first year of the baby's life. What are the im-
mothers may indirectly benefit children.
plications of this change for the child's devel-
opment?
References
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Ainsworth, M. D. (1975). The development of in-
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