Abstract
The emotional attachment that develops between a child and the caregiver is the first nonverbal interactive relationship of one’s life. The bonding, which develops at this stage, would determine how one would relate to people around, throughout one’s life. The aim of this study was to assess the maternal–neonatal bonding among postnatal mothers and to identify factors affecting bonding among postnatal mothers. The investigators adopted a descriptive survey research design using a purposive sampling technique to collect data from 60 postnatal mothers. Pretesting and reliability of the tool was done and it was found to be reliable. Tools were developed and sent for validation to experts. The data were collected after taking prior administrative permission and consent from the participants. The study findings show that out of 60 postnatal mothers, majority (51.6%) were in the age group of 25 to 30 years. Majority (55%) were multigravida and all (100%) were married. Majority (85.0%) of the mothers had a planned pregnancy,93.3% did not undergo any fertility treatment, and majority (91.7%) of them had a regular antenatal checkup. Of the 60 mothers, 81.6% had a high maternal–neonatal bonding and 18.3% had moderate bonding; none had low bonding. Further, the factors affecting maternal–neonatal bonding were analyzed with the cumulative bonding score. Out of the three factors, only social and emotional factors were included for simple linear regression analysis. Physical factors were excluded as there was no association with that of the cumulative bonding score (r = 0 0.16, p = 0.372). Social and emotional factors affect the maternal–neonatal bonding; with every unit change in emotional factor, there will be 0.447 unit change in the bonding score. Similarly, for every unit change in the social factor, there will be 0.453 unit change in the bonding score.
Keywords
fetal - newborn - maternal - postnatal women - bonding
