Is maternal negative affectivity related to psychosocial behavior of preterm and term-born toddlers through mother-child interaction?

Introduction: Children born moderately to late preterm (MLP) are more prone to psychosocial difficulties than their term-born counterparts. Maternal negative affectivity (NA)-a relatively stable personality trait characterized by the tendency to experience negative thoughts, feelings and emotions-has been related to more psychosocial problems in their offspring, and to a lower quality of mother-child interactions. As MLP children seem more sensitive to their early caregiving environment, they might be more affected by maternal NA and interaction style than their term-born peers. The current study investigated whether maternal NA predicted child's psychosocial outcomes through quality of mother-child interaction, and if these associations differed between MLP and term-born children. Methods: The sample consisted of 108 MLP and 92 term-born children and their mothers. At 18 months corrected age, maternal NA was measured using a self-report questionnaire and mother-child interaction was observed during two structured tasks. Five subscales of mother-child interaction were assessed: negative interaction, reciprocal engagement, emotional support, maternal stimulation and mother-led interaction. At 24 months corrected age, social-emotional difficulties, internalizing, and externalizing problems were assessed using mother-report. Results: For MLP children, maternal NA directly, positively, predicted social-emotional difficulties ( Discussion: Maternal NA was found to be a risk factor for psychosocial outcomes in toddlers, either directly for MLP children or indirectly through mother-led interaction for term-born children. These findings suggest that the process through which maternal NA affects psychosocial outcomes may be different for MLP and term-born children. However, as the examined moderation effects of birth status did not reach statistical significance, more research using larger sample sizes is needed to study mother-child interaction in greater detail.