An investigation of expectant parents' emotional stability, perception of locus of control, and parental role identification

The primary focus of this research was on the emotional status of expectant mothers and expectant fathers. A comparison between couples who were currently expecting a child and couples who had had a child within one calendar year of the testing period was made. Specifically, expectant mothers were compared to present mothers and expectant fathers were compared to present fathers on three personality variables: the degree of emotional stability, the perception of the locus of internal-external control, and parental role identification. This comparison was made to determine whether men and women who were currently expecting a child would differ significantly from similar men and women who had already had their child in relation to the three selected variables.Participants in Lamaze prepared childbirth training were selected as the population to be studied. Members of one of four Lamaze prepared childbirth classes selected as the population for the research were asked to take part in the study. Twenty-one couples agreed to participate; the 21 pregnant women comprised the expectant mother sample, while the 21 husbands of the pregnant women comprised the expectant father sample. In order to compare the expectant parent samples to an appropriate control group, 100 former Lamaze participants who received their training from the same Lamaze instructors who provided instruction to the expectant parent samples were contacted and asked to take part in the study. Twenty-one couples volunteered; the 21 women comprised the present mothers sample, and the 21 men made up the present fathers sample. All subjects in the expectant parents samples were tested on the second meeting of their regularly scheduled Lamaze class. Those couples in the present parents samples attended a specially scheduled testing period.Six hypotheses were formulated relative to emotional stability, perception of the locus of internal-external control and parental role identification. The multiple choice Inquiry items of the Blacky Pictures Test served as the measure of emotional stability. Each subject's perception of the locus of control was measured by the Internal-External Locus of Control Scale (I-E Scale). An additional measure was obtained to determine whether a subject was unusually involved with the parental role. A writer-designed adaptation of the Blacky Pictures Test served as a measure of identification with the parental figures depicted on the Blacky Pictures Test illustrations. The adaptation consisted of the addition of the following question to the standard Inquiry items on each card: "With which character do you feel most involved on this card? Mama, Papa, Blacky, or Tippy?" Because the parent figures are depicted on only three of the 11 critical cards, four or more responses that indicated involvement (or identification) with the parental figures was considered to indicate unusual involvement with the parental figures. In addition to these three measurements, all subjects completed a demographic questionnaire.Statistical analyses were carried out to determine whether there were significant differences (p <.05) between the same sex samples. Results indicated two significant findings. Present fathers were found to be less emotionally stable than expectant fathers. In addition, the expectant mothers tended to identify significantly more often with the parental figures than did present mothers. All other measured variables failed to show significant differences. No significant differences were found between the expectant mother sample and the present mother sample in their perception of the locus of internal-external control; similarly expectant fathers and present fathers were not significantly different on the perception of control variable. Findings also indicated that no significant difference existed between the two father samples on the identification with the parental role variable. No significant difference was found between the two mother samples on the emotional stability variable.Thesis (D. Ed.