Maternal Stress and the Effects of Childhood Development Essay

In conducting my research on instructional studies, I had the chance to review numerous academic journals with many antithetic studies. I chose to read, The Role of Prenatal engenderlike Stress in Child Development, by Janet A.DiPietro in the, Current Directions in mental Science journal. The title of the record itself does identify the in aquiline and dependent variable. The independent variable is the effect of stress, and the dependent variable is the childs development. In reading the introduction, I learned that throughout history deal have thought that the emotions and experiences of a pregnant woman impinge on her developing fetus. (DiPietro, 2004) I also learned that there are no direct neural connections between the mother and fetus. (DiPietro, 2004) The journal went on to tell apart the physiological processes involved in mother to fetus bio-chemical and hormonal functions. The briny studies used in determining theoretical explanations throughout history, have be en in animal studies.According to DiPietro (2004), the most compelling evidence between matriarchal physiological functioning and later development in offspring is run aground in animal studies. (p. 1). The possible action of this study suggests that maternal stressors are much far-reaching on child behavior than previously suspected. (DiPietro, 2004). The main way that this hypothesis has been studied is by utilizing animal research. In a series of studies exonerate with rhesus monkeys, when the mothers were exposed to loud noises throughout motherhood, the offspring showed delayed move development and reduced attention. (DiPietro, 2004) It does seem that most of the studies conducted on animals have inform negative consequences. Although reports of either no effects or beneficial ones make it clear that much is left to be learned about the item characteristics of stressors that either accelerate or retard development. (DiPietro, 2004) The subjects used in the methods pa rtition were humans.Although, according to the clause, this is difficult to study in the human because of the physiological differences during the pregnancies of the different species, and the fact that researchers are unable to control regular(a)ts that transpire after blood in humans. (DiPietro, 2004) Therefore, there are no graphs, charts or statistical measures seen in this article. There were several methods used to analyze the data in this article. whizz was the survey. Surveys were done with mothers who had witnessed a catastrophic even such as the erecting Trade Center disaster, or an earthquake. Although the study was able to show that the mother was indeed stressed during pregnancy, there was no study conducted on the case of the child. (DiPietro, 2004) Another method had mothers report about their stress incurred during pregnancy, and then an reviewer and not a parent rated the infants behavior. The article suggests that even the resulting information in this study may be skewed, because the studies relied on the spawns reports of their childrens problems.It finally became apparent through this study that the further way for the researchers to examine the effects of stressors on the fetus was to subject women to a non-invasive stressor and then measure fetal response. (DiPietro, 2004) They gave these women a standardized examine called the, Stroop Color-Word Test. (DiPietro, 2004) The test caused the women to feel cognitively challenged, therefore inducing increased physiological responses in mother, but interestingly, not in the fetus. Fetal motor activity was very suppressed, according to the study. (DiPietro, 2004) The final results of the study showed that higher maternal anxiety midway through pregnancy were strongly associated with better motor and mental development scores on the Bayley Scales of Infant Development. (DiPietro, 2004) Interestingly, the research conducted on humans, showed that the effects on the developing child ar e opposite of the effects on animals.The article ends with this statement, Too much or too little stress may impede development, but a moderate level may be formative or optimal. It seems that there is really too little research on this area of study to come to a conclusion. I found this study to be very interesting and relevant to todays issues within society, and especially the head of nature versus nurture. It makes me think about children who are displaying such violent behaviors such as shooting their classmates and parents.It makes me ask the question of what was going on in the mothers environment during pregnancy? Did she have an easy, stress free, supported pregnancy, or was there fighting and excitement during the pregnancy? Could factors such as these affect the child and develop into what we punctuate as sociopathic? It would be interesting to conduct a study of pregnant women in a prison setting versus pregnant women in an ideal pregnancy situation, and to study the offspring from birth to five geezerhood old. Would the affects of the pregnant woman in prison create certain developmental issues in the children? Does it even matter? These questions and many more within the psychological science realm are what make this a fascinating discipline to study. It very is the nature of ourselves that we get to ask questions about, and find the deeper, hidden meanings.ReferencesDiPietro, J. A. (2004, April). The role of antepartum maternal stress in child development. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 13(2), 71-74. Retrieved from http//www.jstor.org/stable/20182913