A new study suggests that a mother’s happiness in a relationship and level of social support might play a role in the health of an infant.
Kjerulff and his team reached their findings by assessing the data of 3,006 women aged between 18 and 35 years who were a part of Penn State’s first baby study. All women had given birth to their first child between January 2009 and April 2011.
As part of the study, mothers were required to report how happy they were with their partner, how much social support they received from their partner and the level of social support they received from family members and friends.
The researchers found that the happier mothers were in their relationship during and after pregnancy, the less likely they were to have an infant with colic. This finding remained even after accounting for postpartum depression.
Additionally, the risk of colic was lower for infants of mothers who reported greater social support from their partners. In particular, the team found that the more partners helped with infant care and the greater a partner’s love and affection for the baby, the lower their infant’s colic risk.
The researchers were interested to find that the lowest risk of colic was found among infants of single mothers. While this finding was deemed statistically insignificant, the team pointed out that single mothers reported having higher levels of general social support, which may contribute to lower colic risk for infants.
“If you don’t have a partner you can still have lots of social support, a lot of love, and a lot of happy relationships, and all of that is going to be better for the baby,”kjerulff said.
He told, “Love makes a difference”.
