MATERNITY LEAVE AND WOMENS MENTAL-HEALTH

The Wisconsin Maternity Leave and Health Study addresses an important policy issue, parental leave, by investigating the work status, matern ity leave, and mental health of 570 women. In the longitudinal design, the women, all of whom were living with a husband or partner, were in terviewed during the fifth month of pregnancy, 1 month postpartum, and 4 months postpartum. At 4 months postpartum, full-time workers, part- time workers, and homemakers did not differ in depression or anger, bu t full-time workers showed elevated anxiety compared with the other tw o groups. In multiple regression analyses, length of leave interacted significantly with marital concerns when predicting depression; women who took a short leave (6 weeks or less) and were high on marital conc erns had the highest depression scores. Short maternity leave can be c onceptualized as a risk factor that, when combined with other risk fac tors such as marital concerns, places women at greater risk for depres sion.