A Comparative Study on Infant's Temperament & Parenting Stress by Premature & Full-term Infant's Mother

미숙아 어머니와 정상아 어머니가 지각한 영아의 기질과 양육스트레스

This research is to compare the infant's temperament and parenting stress perceived by premature infants' mother and full-term infants' mother. It aims at establishing the healthy relationship between mothers and infants. It investigates the basic data of nursing intervention program to help the mother of premature infant. The period of data collection was from May 1, 2005 to May 30, 2005, and the subjects were total 123 mothers: 44 mothers of premature infants and 79 mothers of full-term infants under 6 months who visited general hospitals, individual pediatrics, and health center located in G city. "What My Baby Is Like(WBL)" developed by Pridham, Chang, and Chiu(1994) and translated by Bang Kyeong Sook(1999) was used as a measuring instrument of infants' temperament, and Parenting Stress Index (PSI) developed by Abidin(1990) and revised and complemented by Kim Dong Hee(1997) was used as a measuring instrument of parenting stress. Collected Data were analyzed through $X^2$-test, t-test, Pearson's correlation with SPSS 12.0 window program. The results are as follows: 1. There was a significant difference in the infant's temperament perceived by premature infants' mothers and full-term infants' mothers (t=-4.08, p=.00). In subcategory, there were significant difference between premature infants' mother and full-term infants' mother in geniality(t=-3.62, p=.00), adaptation(t=-3.43, p=.00) and reaction(t=-2.01, p=.05). 2. There was a significant difference in parenting stress between premature infants' mother and full-term infants' mother(t=6.57, p=.00). The parenting stress of premature infants mothers appeared to be higher than full-term infants' mothers. They showed the higher stress in the mother-child relationship area(t=6.27, p=.00) and child area(t=7.38, p=.00) among 3 areas of parenting stress. 3. There were negative correlation between infants' temperament and parenting stress. As mothers perceived the infant's temperament negatively, the parenting stress. Especially, the negative correlation of infants' temperament and parenting stress of premature infants' mothers(r=-.44) was stronger than that of full-term infants' mothers(r=-37). From the research, as mothers of premature infants receive more stress, their stress can cause the serious problem to the relationship of the mother and the infant. Therefore, the nursing intervention should be carried out in order to change the negative perception of mothers towards their infants into the positive perception reduce the parenting stress.