The Effects of a Social Support Group on Depression, Maternal Attitudes and Behavior in New Mothers

Abstract

The present study examined the effects of a postpartum Social Support Group intervention on mood state, attitudes and behavior of new mothers. Intervention conditions consisted of an eight session Social Support intervention (n = 44), a no intervention condition (n= 83) and a Group‐by‐Mail intervention (n= 15). Attitudinal and behavioral assessments were made before and after the interventions at 6 and 20 weeks postpartum, respectively. The primary results indicate that regardless of intervention condition mothers undergo an improvement in mood from 2 weeks to 5 months posspartum. Although the Social Support intervention did not alleviate maternal depression and. in fact, may be detrimental to depressed mothers' self‐confidence, it did increase mothers' proximal attention to their infants.