Early intervention using Brazelton training with middle-class mothers and fathers of newborns

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to test the effectiveness of the Brazelton exam as a parent education tool for mothers and fathers. 42 middle-class families with firstborn, healthy, full-term infants were randomly assigned to one of three groups: father treatment, mother treatment, and control. The target parents in the treatment groups were taught to perform the Brazelton exam on their own infant, with attention being drawn to the infant's most positive interactive and physical abilities. Questionnaire and observational data were collected in the hospital and at 4 weeks postpartum. These included measures of knowledge of infant behavior, confidence in parenting ability, satisfaction with the infant, and behavior with the infant. The results showed that treatment parents scored higher in knowledge about infants, at both the early and the 4-week periods. Also, treatment fathers were more involved in caretaking with their infants at 4 weeks than were control fathers. More modest treatment effects were shown for confidence and satisfaction measures. No behavioral treatment effects were found during a 10-min observation of parent-infant interaction.