Depression may lead mothers to wake babies

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. Depressed mothers are more likely to needlessly wake up their infants at night than mothers who are not depressed, according to Penn State researchers. "We found that mothers with high depressive symptom levels are more likely to excessively worry about their infants at night than mothers with low symptom levels, and that such mothers were more likely to seek out their babies at night and spend more time with their infants than mothers with low symptom levels," said Douglas M. Teti, associate director of the Social Science Research Institute and professor of human development, psychology and pediatrics. "This, in turn, was associated with increased night waking in the infants of depressed mothers, compared to the infants of non-depressed mothers," Teti said. "Especially interesting about this was that when depressed mothers sought out their infants at night, their infants did not appear to be in need of parental help. They were either sound asleep or perhaps awake, but not distressed." In contrast, mothers with low levels of worry and depressive symptoms rarely woke their infants out of a sound sleep and hardly went to their infants at night unless the infants were distressed. The researchers also found evidence that infants who wake often during the night can lead to higher depressive symptoms in mothers, but the evidence for this infant-driven pathway was not as strong.