The story unfolds with heartbreaking frequency in every
corner of the country. A girl — raised in a low-income
home, maybe in the shadow of domestic violence, abuse,
depression or addiction — grows out of a troubled
relationship with her parents and into a troubled relationship
with a partner.
She learns she's pregnant, but, having never had
much of a role model, she doesn't really grasp what it
really means to be responsible for someone else. When
her baby is born, she has no template for a good relationship,
and the baby grows up with no idea how to have one. So,
another generation goes from a troubled relationship with
her parents to a troubled relationship with a partner,
and the story starts over again.
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BREAKING THE CYCLE: Alissa Huth-Bocks,
an EMU psychology professor, and a group
of 20
EMU students, are observing 120
low-income women
for an 18-month
period — from the final
trimester of
pregnancy until their baby is a year
old.
With the help of a grant from the American
Psychoanalytic
Association, they hope to
learn how these women,
many raised in
low-income and abusive homes, learn
to
become parents and, perhaps, break a
negative
cycle.
|
It's hard to say where the cycle starts or ends, but with
an ongoing study of low-income women in Washtenaw County,
Eastern Michigan psychology professor Alissa Huth-Bocks
is hoping to figure out how such a cycle can be broken.
With a $29,353 grant from the American Psychoanalytic
Association, Huth-Bocks and a crew of approximately 20
EMU graduate students and undergraduates will follow 120
women through a pivotal 18-month period in their lives,
from the final trimester of their pregnancy until their
baby is a year old. They'll look at how these women learn
to parent in the face of adversity.
"There is a minority of resilient women who are in some
very difficult circumstances who sort of rise to the occasion," said
Huth-Bocks. "Some get professional help; some work out
and resolve old relationship problems; some seek more social
support. There is a subset who overcome their history of
adversity and parent really well.
"I think we can learn a lot from those women, what internal
characteristics they have or what resources they have that
allow them to break the intergenerational cycle," she said.
The seeds for this study were planted when Huth-Bocks
was an undergraduate herself. She was involved with the
Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health, working
with women who'd been battered by their partners. Often,
it turned out domestic violence was often just one of many
hurdles in their lives. As a family and child psychologist,
she wondered how those troubles — particularly in
combination — affect the way parenting develops from
its very earliest stages.
"It's believed in pregnancy that there's really a significant
psychological shift, from a person who had always thought
of themselves as being the recipient of care to a point
where, all of a sudden, you're the provider of care," Huth-Bocks
said. "I'm interested in studying how women make this shift.
Some make it seamlessly. If they had good relationships
in the past, it's easy to make the shift. If you haven't
been taken care of, haven't had the experience of people
caring for you and valuing you and loving you, it's very
hard to imagine yourself doing that for someone else."
The study began in October 2007 and includes 75 women
so far. Because they're aiming for a high-risk pool for
the study, Huth-Bocks and her students recruit women through
public assistance programs and community health clinics
for the uninsured. Women who agree to be part of the study
are interviewed in their last trimester of pregnancy and,
again when their baby is three months old. When their baby
is a year old, a final, more extensive interview is conducted.
Participants are paid $85 for their time, with the amount
spread out over the three interviews.
Several of the graduate students working on the study
also have papers of their own tied to the project, and
psychology students at every level recruit and interview
the women in the study, which makes it an invaluable, hands-on
experience for the students, Huth-Bocks said.
"I think it's really incredible. Research experience for
students is really important, no matter what type of experience
it is," Huth-Bocks said. "But, I think one thing that's
unique for students is that everyone, even the undergraduates,
get trained to conduct the interviews. That's pretty unusual
for them. I supervise very closely, because they're doing
very sensitive clinical interviews. It's a very sensitive,
complicated process, and I've had undergraduates say to
me, 'I've learned more in doing this than I ever could
have in a class.'"
