ATTITUDES TOWARD MOTHERHOOD IN POSTNATAL DEPRESSION - DEVELOPMENT OF THE MATERNAL ATTITUDES QUESTIONNAIRE

This article describes the development of the Maternal Attitudes Quest ionnaire (MAQ), a 14-item self-report instrument measuring cognitions relating to role change, expectations of motherhood, and expectations of the self as a mother in postnatal women. This questionnaire was fou nd to have good test-retest and internal reliability. In a large sampl e of women (n=483) at 6-8 weeks postpartum, scores on the questionnair e were highly correlated with scores on the Edinburgh Postnatal Depres sion Scale (EPDS) and the Revised Clinical Interview Schedule (CIS-R). Cluster analysis demonstrated that, among depressed women with simila r symptom scores on the CIS-R, the MAQ discriminated a group with low MAQ scores and a group with high MAQ scores. This finding supports the hypothesis that women who are depressed postnatally are cognitively h eterogeneous; such differences may be important in understanding the e tiology and determining the treatment of postnatal depression. (C) 199 7 Elsevier Science Inc.