Abstract
This study focuses on mothers’ and young children’s everyday social experience by analyzing their social relationships, social support in child care, mother-child interaction, and mothers’ evaluations of all these aspects. Three hundred and eighty-four mothers with a child aged between I and 3 years, living in a city in Central Italy, were interviewed. A Principal Components Analysis was performed on items concerning mothers’ and children’s social experience and mothers’ evaluations. Four PCA generated factors were regressed on the mother’s and Four PCA generated factors were regressed on the mother’s and child’s characteristics. Results show that, even in a context characterized by social conditions supportive to mothering, there is a comparatively widespread desire for social interaction with other mothers and children. A stress related to intensive mothering was found in a minority of the mothers and was predicted by the mothers’ continuous commitment in child care during the whole day. Results are discussed in relation to the hypothesis that social contacts with other mothers may have a mitigating effect on mothers’ stress. One implication is that early educational services that provide the opportunity for social intercourse among parents can be an important resource for them.
Résumé
Cette étude est centrée sur l’expérience sociale dès mères avec leurs petits enfants dans la vie quotidienne. On analyse leurs relations sociales, l’aide reçu dans les soins de l’enfant, leurs interactions avec leur enfant ainsi que leurs évaluations de tous ces aspects. On a interviewé 384 mères d’enfants âgés entre 1 et 3 ans, rèsidant dans une ville de l’Italie Centrale. Les résultats montrent que même dans un contexte social favorable on retrouve très fréquemment chez les mères le désir d’interactions sociales avec d’autres mères et enfants. On retrouve aussi chez une minorité de mères l’expression d’un certain stress concernant leur maternage intensif; ce stress pouvant être attribué à leur engagement continu, dans le soin de l’enfant pendant toute la journée. On discute les résultats par rapport à l’hypothèse que les rapports sociaux avec d’autres mères de jeunes enfants puissent atténuer le stress des mères. Une conséquence importante en serait que les services éducatifs pour la petite enfance, qui offrent l’occasion aux parents de se retrouver, entre eux, puissent constituer une ressource importante.
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Resarch support for this project was provided by the National Research Council, Italy and the City of Terni.
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Rullo, G., Musatti, T. Mothering young children: Child care, stress and social life. Eur J Psychol Educ 20, 107–119 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03173502
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03173502