Adolescent mothering: child-grandmother attachment

Tailoring clinical services to address the unique needs of adolescents from the pregnancy test to parenthood

Clinicians across disciplines and practice settings are likely to encounter adolescents who are at risk for a pregnancy. In 2010, 34.2/1000 15-19-year-old teens had a live birth in the United States, many more will seek care for a pregnancy scare or options counseling. Teen mothers are also at risk for a second or higher-order pregnancy during adolescence. This paper provides clinicians with adolescent-friendly clinical and counseling strategies for pregnancy prevention, pre- and post-pregnancy test counseling, pregnancy-related care, and a review of the developmental challenges encountered by teens in the transition to parenthood. Clinicians are in a better position to approach the developmental, health and mental health needs of adolescents related to pregnancy if they understand and appreciate the obstacles adolescents may face negotiating the healthcare system. In addition, when clinical services are specially tailored to the needs of the adolescent, fewer opportunities will be lost to prevent unintended pregnancies, assist teens into timely prenatal services, and improve outcomes for their pregnancies and the transition to parenthood.

A review of attachment theory in the context of adolescent parenting

The purpose of this article is to review attachment theory and relate the attachment perspective to adolescent mothers and their children. Attachment theory explains positive maternal-infant attachment as a dyadic relationship between the infant and mother that provides the infant with a secure base from which to explore the world. With respect to cognitive, social, and behavioral domains, securely attached infants tend to have more favorable long-term outcomes, while insecurely attached infants are more likely to have adverse outcomes. Adolescent parenthood can disrupt normal adolescent development, and this disruption influences development of the emotional and cognitive capacities necessary for maternal behaviors that foster secure attachment. However, it appears that if specialized supports are in place to facilitate the process of developing attachment, infants of adolescent mothers can obtain higher rates of secure attachment than normative samples in this population.

Furthering the understanding of parent-child relationships: a nursing scholarship review series. Part 5: parent-adolescent and teen parent-child relationships

PURPOSE

The purpose of this paper is to examine nursing's contribution to understanding the parent-adolescent and the teen parent-child relationships.

CONCLUSION

Relationships between parents and adolescents may reflect turmoil and affect adolescents' health and development. The social and developmental contexts for teen parenting are powerful and may need strengthening. Several interventions to help teen mothers interact sensitively with their infants have been developed and tested.

PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS

Nurse researchers have begun to provide evidence for practitioners to use in caring for families of adolescents and teen parents to acquire interaction skills that, in turn, may promote optimal health and development of the child.

Economic disadvantage in complex family systems: expansion of family stress models

Economic disadvantage is associated with multiple risks to early socioemotional development. This article reviews research regarding family stress frameworks to model the pathways from economic disadvantage to negative child outcomes via family processes. Future research in this area should expand definitions of family and household to incorporate diversity and instability. This expansion would be particularly relevant for research among low-income ethnic minority families and families with young children. This line of research would highlight specific pathways to target to prevent the onset of early parental and child dysfunction.

Preliminary reliability and validity of the grandparent version of the Grandparent Support Scale for Teenage Mothers (GSSTM-G)

This study demonstrates the preliminary reliability and validity of the grandparent version of the Grandparent Support Scale for Teenage Mothers (GSSTM-G), a measure designed to assess grandparents' perceptions of triadic relationships that support or imperil the teen mother's care of her baby. Grandparents (N = 61) who participated in this study were parents and parent surrogates of teen mothers who completed a teen version of the scale (GSSTM-T). Principal axis factoring with oblique rotation resulted in a reduction of the GSSTM-G scale from 19 to 14 items. A two-factor solution was supported by item factor loadings and conceptual clarity. The GSSTM-G factors revealed two different patterns of family relationships, Responsive Family Relationships (alpha = .82) and Adversarial Family Relationships (alpha = .81), that correlated with other measures. Construct validity and internal consistency support further exploration of the GSSTM-G as a measure of family relationships, as related to the care of the infant, from grandparents' perspectives.

A Comparison of the Postpartum Learning Needs of Adolescent Mothers and Their Mothers

OBJECTIVES

To describe the postpartum learning needs of adolescent mothers and their mothers and to compare the differences between the learning needs of the 2 groups of women.

DESIGN

Descriptive cross-sectional survey design.

SETTING

One university hospital and 2 private Midwestern hospitals.

PARTICIPANTS

Convenience sample of 100 women (50 mother/daughter pairs).

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES

Postpartum teaching questionnaire-E, postpartum teaching questionnaire-F, and demographic questionnaire.

RESULTS

There were no group differences between adolescent mothers and their mothers on baby-care items, but there were group differences on 3 maternal-care items: emotional changes (p < .001), resumption of sexual activity (p < .001), and birth control (p = .009).

CONCLUSIONS

Nurses may need to use different teaching strategies for adolescent mothers and their mothers about resumption of sexual activity, but the teaching strategies necessary for other postpartum topics may be similar. Further research is needed to determine where those similarities may be and to determine the most effective teaching strategies for each group of mothers.

Parental competence among African American adolescent mothers and grandmothers

This study describes the influence of grandmothers on parental competence among urban African American adolescent mothers, using a model adapted from Belsky's (1984) Determinants of Parenting Process Model. The sample included 53 pairs of urban African American mothers (age 16.4 +/- 1.2 years) and their mothers (age 39.2 +/- 4.3 years). All adolescents were enrolled in school, co-resided with mothers, and had infants ages 4 to 8 months. Survey instruments measured personal resources, perception of infant temperament, and contextual sources of support and stress. The outcome measure for adolescent mothers was perceived parental competence. Multiple regression analyses indicated adolescent mothers' self-esteem and mastery explained 41% of the variance and grandmothers' self-esteem explained 42% of the variance in adolescent mothers' parental competence. A combined regression equation demonstrated that adolescent mothers' mastery and grandmothers' self-esteem accounted for 65% of the variance in adolescent mothers' parental competence.