Literary Research
Research into scientific literature was focused on the challenges that new parents face. Even though our project is focused on the mother, the papers cited look at the challenges that both new mothers and fathers face. We recognised that certain life aspects and standards have changed since the 1990s or early 2000s. Therefore, we tried to select papers published within the last decade (2010 to present) to stay relevant.
Nomaguchi
& Milkie
(2020)
Decade in Review
Parental Challenges
Lévesque
et. al
(2020)
Interviews
New Parents Challenges
Sanders
et. al
(2021)
Interviews
Setting Expectations
Gilmer
et. al
(2016)
Realist Review
Parent Education
Table of Contents
Introduction
Conducted mostly independent from our interview, we wanted to look at challenges that parents, specifically new parents face. To link back to the research question, we are answering the sub-question, "What are the changes that new parents face?".
We limit research to date only as far back as 2010 due to economic, health and technological differences. Nowadays, women are also working which means research dating back to 1950s would mostly be looking at the context of housewives and not working wives. Additionally, the ability to afford a child would look different in the recent decade than it did two decades or more ago.
To brief you over the studies, Nomaguchi and Milkie (2020) looked at stressors or challenges that parents face. In other words, these are challenges that parents including new parents face throughout parenthood. Lévesque et. al (2020) interviewed new parents (including two lesbian couples) on challenges they pre and post pregnancy. Sanders et. al (2023) looked at how expectations are set and affect how new parents react to changes. They suggest parent education might better prep couples for parenthood. Gilmer et. al (2016) examined the effectiveness of parent education.
Studies
Nomaguchi & Milkie (2020)
As it is a decade in review article, it reviews all research published within the past decade (2010 - 2019) that is relevant to the topic of parenthood. To help identify the stressors (challenges) faced by parents, they used the stress processing model. Here are the main five that we took from their review.
1/ Parenting Role Overload
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This is referring the how parents can perceive that child-care demand more of their time, attention than they are capable of.
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From the studies they reviewed, parenting role overload is often measured as respondents' perception of feeling overwhelmed.
The stressors or strains vary by economic, social and cultural context. These would in turn also affect the well being of parents. The review also look into strains of raising children with special needs, due to race, immigration, etc. Not only, that they give some noted on raising adult children.
However, the article doesn't focus on new parents but parenthood as a whole. There is not a lot of focus on struggles with infancy but rather parenthood in its entirety. Therefore, we need a second study to confirm, add or remove stressors mentioned by Nomaguchi & Milkie (2020).
Lévesque et. al (2020)
In comparison to Nomaguchi & Milkie (2020), Lévesque et. al (2020) specifically look at challenges of first-time parents with children between 6-18 months. This fits with context of our participant.
1/ Loss of individuality and couple due to primary identity as a parent during the transition to parenthood
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Raising a child requires considerable selflessness
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Forgetting to put time for themselves as parents
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Put themselves aside in order to prioritise the baby
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Balancing the roles: no easy task
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Role as a parent and a partner
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No time for yourself but also no time to care and nurture your relationship with your partner
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Sizeable effort to be a partner
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Lévesque et. al (2020) identified 4 main themes and their sub-themes in relation to struggles that new parents face. Some of these also fit with context of the participant. For example, the parental equality can be identified as a stressor for our participant. However, from the interview, this was not an issue. The bigger issue was balancing work and family life. A challenge mentioned by the participant as struggling between entertaining the baby and focusing on work.
Sanders et. al (2021)
Having now acquired some of the challenges that new parents faced between 6-18 months, we wanted to know what could be the cause of such challenges for new parents. Sanders et. al (2021) suggests that it might be due to preconceived ideas of parenthood i.e. expectations.
Some of the challenges they mentioned are:
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Sleep patterns
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Breastfeeding
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Settling the baby
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Sense of personal inadequacy and loneliness
Sanders et. al (2023) suspect that these challenges may be a result of unrealistic expectations of what parenthood would look like. In other words, parents often have an idealised parenthood with little to no issues or the issues would not affect them as much. They argue that such ideals lead to new parents being less prepared for parenthood.
They suggest that better preparation for first-time parents about baby care to set more realistic expectations. Stating that it may reduce stress, confusion, and self-doubt. Reduction in stress and self doubt are results that we can aim for with our product.
However, the group of participants is quite small and homogenous, and the researchers were only looking at the first few months of the baby (maybe less than 6 months). Thus, their findings may not accurately translate to our participant.
Gilmer et. al (2016)
Sanders et. al (2021) recommended better preparation for new parents, specifically education for new parents. Gilmer et. al (2016) reviews studies that looked at parent education.
Their research mentioned that the studies often fail to assess parents' knowledge when caring for a baby before starting the program. If we are aiming to create a personalised education program, we should keep in mind to assess the participant's prior knowledge.
Another issue with parent education is a lack of father-oriented content. Some studies identified the need to for such content but failed to implement in the design of the education.
Lastly, they stated that there are no pre-exisiting parent education programmes that can meet the needs of parents on a universal level. Suggesting that no amount of education can fully prepare a parent as different parents have different needs when it comes to parenting.
We think it is key that we try not to solve all problems of our participant. As it would not be possible to satisfy all the needs and issues.
Conclusion
From our literary research, the challenges identified in the interviews have overlap with challenges that new parents face. There are often overlaps in trying to balance work and family life. However, we should not try to create a parent education as we not be able to meet parent needs if we were to expand. Additionally, we are not experts to be creating an education programme for our particpant. It is best to find an alternative solution.
References
[1] K. Nomaguchi and M. A. Milkie, “Parenthood and Well‐Being: A Decade in Review,” Journal of Marriage and Family, vol. 82, no. 1, pp. 198–223, Jan. 2020, doi: https://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12646.
[2] S. Lévesque, V. Bisson, L. Charton, and M. Fernet, “Parenting and Relational Well-being During the Transition to Parenthood: Challenges for First-time Parents,” Journal of Child and Family Studies, vol. 29, no. 7, pp. 1938–1956, May 2020, doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-020-01727-z.
[3] R. E. Sanders, J. Lehmann, and F. Gardner, “Title: New Parents’ Idealistic Expectations of Parenthood: The Impact of Preconceived Ideas,” Journal of Family Issues, vol. 44, no. 3, p. 0192513X2110551, Nov. 2021, doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/0192513x211055124.
[4] C. Gilmer et al., “Parent education interventions designed to support the transition to parenthood: A realist review,” International journal of nursing studies, vol. 59, pp. 118–33, 2016, doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2016.03.015.