Postnatal Depression Negatively Affects Relationships Into Grandparenting

New research from the University of Kent, finds that Postnatal depression (PND) has a life-long impact, affecting the relationship a mother has with their child, as well as with their child’s future child.

Whilst it’s already known that PND affects a mother’s relationship with their child, new research led by Dr Sarah Myers and overseen by Dr Sarah Johns in the School of Anthropology and Conservation, finds that PND also has a negative impact on the future relationship between their grandchildren. It was also discovered that the worse the postnatal depression, the lower the quality of relationship between mother and child into adulthood.

Researchers looked for a wide range of women who had given birth to see how PND impacted over a lifetime. A total of 305 women from both the UK and US took part. The average age of the mother was 60 years, with an average of 2.2 children at an average age of 29 years.

Findings showed that mums who had PND following birth had lower a quality relationship with the specific child who had triggered the depression.

The same mums also formed a lower quality relationship with the grandchild of that child, showing that PND continues in a negative cycle.

Mums who had depression at life stages other than birth were found to have had a worse relationship with all of their children.

The research – Postnatal depression is associated with detrimental life-long and multi-generational impacts on relationship quality – has been published in the open-access journal PeerJ.

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