Stability of Maternal Socioemotional Investment in Young Children

Objective. To investigate the stability of 3 constructs (Sensitivity, Delight, and Acceptance of the Parenting Role) of mothers' socioemotional investment in the young child from 15 months and 36 months postpartum. Design. A sample of 102 mothers participated. Factor structure stability, rank-order stability, and mean-level stability were investigated by confirmatory factor analysis, correlational analysis, and paired t tests, respectively. Results. All 3 domains of maternal investment showed reasonable stability. Each maternal investment measure showed at least a basic test of factorial stability. Both Sensitivity and Delight passed stringent tests of factorial stability, and Acceptance of the Parenting Role contained one item that was less valid at 36 months. There were no mean-level differences across time, and all rank-order stability coefficients were above. 50. Conclusions. The stability observed in maternal socioemotional investment, together with findings showing stability in related aspects of parental beliefs and attitudes, suggests that it may be neither simple nor easy to effect change in parents' attitudes and feelings regarding the child.