Predictors and correlates of maternal role competence and satisfaction

BACKGROUND: Developing a sense of competence and satisfaction in the maternal role enhances positive parenting and healthy development of the child. There is limited longitudinal research on the predictive factors influencing maternal role competence and satisfaction. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to determine the predictive and concurrent associations of prenatal perceived maternal role competence, learned resourcefulness, social support, stress, and depression to perceived maternal role competence and satisfaction at 6 weeks postpartum. METHOD: A longitudinal, descriptive design was used. A convenience sample of 184 first-time pregnant women with a singleton and uneventful pregnancy were recruited from two regional public hospitals in Hong Kong. The Parenting Sense of Competence Scale, Self-control Schedule, Medical Outcomes Study Social Support Survey, Social Readjustment Rating Scale, and Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale were used to assess maternal role competence and satisfaction, learned resourcefulness, social support, stress, and depressive symptoms, respectively. Data were collected during pregnancy and at 6 weeks postpartum. RESULTS: Multiple regression analysis showed that perceived maternal role competence and satisfaction at 6 weeks postpartum were predicted by prenatal perceived maternal role competence and learned resourcefulness and were associated with postnatal learned resourcefulness and depression. Social support and stress were not associated directly with perceived maternal role competence and satisfaction at 6 weeks postpartum. DISCUSSION: The present findings suggest that maternal learned resourcefulness and depression are important factors affecting perceived maternal role competence and satisfaction at postpartum. Culturally competent healthcare should be developed to promote the psychological well-being of women and to equip women with the learned resourcefulness skills to facilitate maternal role taking and enhance women's sense of competence and satisfaction in the maternal role. Copyright © 2010 Lippincott Williams and Wilkins.link_to_subscribed_fulltex

Two Micromechanical Models in Acoustoelasticity: a Comparative Study

Herein we derive, under the micromechanical model we proposed earlier, Man and Paroni [14], a complete set of formulae for the twelve material constants in the acoustoelastic constitutive equation for orthorhombic aggregates of cubic crystallites. We present also a second model and compare its predictions on the material constants with those of the first model. Both these models lead to constitutive equations which are indifferent to rotation of reference placement. This allows us to appeal to a new representation theorem (Paroni and Man [15]), which greatly facilitates our derivation of the formulae for the material constants. The second model introduced in this paper is intimately related to some previous averaging theories in the literature. We explain why and in what sense our second model could be taken as a generalization of its predecessors