Effect of work-family conflict on antenatal maternal depression across pregnancy

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: Pregnancy itself is a stressful period during which expectant mothers have to adjust themselves to their maternal role. Working expectant mothers may have extra challenge as they may experience work-family conflict and need to occupy both work and family roles simultaneously. Antenatal depression is under researched but it is common over pregnancy and could have adverse impacts on mothers and infants. To fill the research gaps, the present study is to examine the effect of work-family conflict on antenatal depression across different stages of pregnancy. METHODOLOGY: A prospective longitudinal design with quantitative approach was adopted. A consecutive sample of 251 Chinese pregnant women from a hospital in Hong Kong was invited to participate in the study and was assessed using standardized instruments on first, second and third trimester of pregnancy. RESULT: Most (80.9%) of samples are working women. Among working pregnant women, their levels of work-family conflict do not change across three trimesters of pregnancy. The result of hierarchical multiple regressions showed that levels of work-family conflict significantly and independently predict levels of antenatal depressive symptoms at first (β =.28, t=3.88, p<.001) and second trimester (β =.22, t=2.05, p<.05), even after adjusting for the effects of potential confounders. The mixed effect model with repeated measure indicates that levels of work-family conflicts significantly associate with levels of antenatal depressive symptoms across all stages of antenatal period (p<.001). DISCUSSION: Among working pregnant women, work-family conflict is an important issue that needs to be resolved given that it significantly relates to antenatal depressive symptoms which are detrimental to the health of both mothers and infants. Greater research is needed to explore ways to support working pregnant women.