ArticleJournal of consulting and clinical psychology2018
Maternal patterns of antenatal and postnatal depressed mood and the impact on child health at 3-years postpartum.
Article in Journal of consulting and clinical psychology, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 30 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
30 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 59 citations in OpenAlex.
- The epidemiology of maternal mental health in Africa: a systematic review.Archives of women's mental health · 2025Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Impact of maternal mental health interventions on child-related outcomes in low- and middle-income countries: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Epidemiology and psychiatric sciences · 2020Pooled it
- Trial
- Where you live matters: Township neighborhood factors important to resilience among south African children from birth to 5 years of age.Preventive medicine · 2022Trial
- Home Visiting and Antenatal Depression Affect the Quality of Mother and Child Interactions in South Africa.Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry · 2019Trial
- Depressive and anxiety symptomatology among caregivers of children 0-3 years in Nairobi City County: Community-based prevalence study.PLOS global public health · 2026Article
- Prevalence of Depressive Symptoms Amongst Pregnant Women Attending Antenatal Clinics at Quaternary Hospital in Johannesburg, South Africa: A Cross-Sectional Study.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2025Article
- Do the early social environment and persistent peripartum depressive symptoms shape toddlers' expressive language?JCPP advances · 2025Article
- Wife-Mother Role Conflict at the Critical Child-Rearing Stage: A Machine-Learning Approach to Identify What and How Matters in Maternal Depression Symptoms in China.Prevention science : the official journal of the Society for Prevention Research · 2024Article
- Annual Research Review: The power of predictability - patterns of signals in early life shape neurodevelopment and mental health trajectories.Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines · 2024Review
- Perinatal depression and adverse child growth outcomes in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs): A systematic review and meta-analysis.PLOS global public health · 2024Article
- Cumulative adversity, mindfulness, and mental health in first-time mothers experiencing low income.Journal of affective disorders reports · 2023Article
- The trajectory of maternal perinatal depressive symptoms predicts executive function in early childhood.Psychological medicine · 2023Article
- Parental Pre and Postnatal Depression: The Longitudinal Associations with Child Negative Affectivity and Dysfunctional Mother-Child Feeding Interactions.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Maternal antenatal depression's effects on child developmental delays: Gestational age, postnatal depressive symptoms, and breastfeeding as mediators.Journal of affective disorders · 2023Article
- When less is more: The way forward for mental health interventions during the perinatal period.PLoS medicine · 2022Article
- Antenatal depressive symptoms and behavioral outcomes in children at 78 months: A study from South India.Journal of affective disorders reports · 2022Article
- Cumulative exposure to maternal psychological distress in the prenatal and postnatal periods and atopic dermatitis in children: findings from the TMM BirThree Cohort Study.BMC pregnancy and childbirth · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveThe consequences of maternal depressed mood on children's growth, health, and cognitive and language development are examined over the first 3 years of life.
methodPregnant women in 24 periurban township neighborhoods in Cape Town, South Africa (N = 1,238 mothers) were randomized by neighborhood to a home visiting intervention or a standard care condition. Reassessments were conducted for 93%-85% of mothers at 2-weeks, 6-, 18-, and 36-months postbirth. Regressions were conducted on measures of children's growth, behavior, language, and cognition to examine the impact of four patterns of depressed mood: antenatal only (n = 154, 13.8%), postnatal only (n = 272, 24.3%), antenatal and postnatal (n = 220, 19.7%), and no depressed mood on any assessment (n = 473, 42.3%).
resultsPatterns of depressed mood were similar across intervention conditions. Depressed mothers were significantly less educated, had lower incomes, were less likely to be employed or to have electricity; were more likely to report problematic drinking of alcohol, experience food insecurity, interpersonal partner violence, and to be HIV seropositive. At 36 months, the pattern of maternal depressed mood over time was significantly associated with children's compromised physical growth, both in weight and height, and more internalizing and externalizing symptoms of behavior problems. Measures of language and cognition were similar across maternal patterns of depressed mood.
conclusionsMothers who report depressed mood face significantly more life challenges, both environmental stressors related to poverty and other problematic behaviors. More proximal, postnatal depressed mood appears to have a larger influence on their children, compared with antenatal depressed mood. (PsycINFO Database Record
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.