Women’s perceived social support: Associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms
Background Social support may promote healthful behaviors that prevent excess weight at critical periods in women’s life. Our objective was to investigate associations of social support at 6 months postpartum with women’s health behaviors that have previously been shown to predict weight retention...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , |
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| Format: | Journal Article |
| Published: |
BioMed Central
2019
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/81105 |
| _version_ | 1848764315530690560 |
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| author | Millar, Lynne Faleschini, S Rifas-Shiman, S. Skouteris, H Hivert, M. Oken, E |
| author_facet | Millar, Lynne Faleschini, S Rifas-Shiman, S. Skouteris, H Hivert, M. Oken, E |
| author_sort | Millar, Lynne |
| building | Curtin Institutional Repository |
| collection | Online Access |
| description | Background
Social support may promote healthful behaviors that prevent excess weight at critical periods in women’s life. Our objective was to investigate associations of social support at 6 months postpartum with women’s health behaviors that have previously been shown to predict weight retention at 1 year postpartum.
Methods
At 6 months postpartum in Project Viva, a pre-birth prospective cohort in Massachusetts, women reported social support using the Turner Support Scale, depressive symptoms using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale, diet using PrimeScreen, average number of hours walking, light/moderate and vigorous physical activity, television viewing, and sleeping each day.
Results
Among 1356 women, greater partner support was associated with higher levels of walking (OR 1.36, 95% CI [1.01, 1.82]) and intake of fiber (OR 1.43, 95% CI [1.06, 1.91]) and lower intake of trans-fat (OR 1.49, 95% CI [1.11, 2.01]). Support from family/friends was marginally related to healthful levels of light/moderate physical activity (OR 1.26, 95% CI [0.96, 1.65]) and television viewing (OR 1.29, 95% CI [0.99, 1.69]). Both sources of support were strongly associated with lower odds of incident depression (OR 0.33, 95% CI [0.20, 0.55] and OR 0.49, 95% CI [0.30, 0.79], respectively). We did not find associations with vigorous physical activity or sleep duration.
Conclusions
Social support is important to the physical and mental health of new mothers and may promote behaviors that limit postpartum weight retention. |
| first_indexed | 2025-11-14T11:17:24Z |
| format | Journal Article |
| id | curtin-20.500.11937-81105 |
| institution | Curtin University Malaysia |
| institution_category | Local University |
| last_indexed | 2025-11-14T11:17:24Z |
| publishDate | 2019 |
| publisher | BioMed Central |
| recordtype | eprints |
| repository_type | Digital Repository |
| spelling | curtin-20.500.11937-811052021-01-07T07:46:46Z Women’s perceived social support: Associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms Millar, Lynne Faleschini, S Rifas-Shiman, S. Skouteris, H Hivert, M. Oken, E Background Social support may promote healthful behaviors that prevent excess weight at critical periods in women’s life. Our objective was to investigate associations of social support at 6 months postpartum with women’s health behaviors that have previously been shown to predict weight retention at 1 year postpartum. Methods At 6 months postpartum in Project Viva, a pre-birth prospective cohort in Massachusetts, women reported social support using the Turner Support Scale, depressive symptoms using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale, diet using PrimeScreen, average number of hours walking, light/moderate and vigorous physical activity, television viewing, and sleeping each day. Results Among 1356 women, greater partner support was associated with higher levels of walking (OR 1.36, 95% CI [1.01, 1.82]) and intake of fiber (OR 1.43, 95% CI [1.06, 1.91]) and lower intake of trans-fat (OR 1.49, 95% CI [1.11, 2.01]). Support from family/friends was marginally related to healthful levels of light/moderate physical activity (OR 1.26, 95% CI [0.96, 1.65]) and television viewing (OR 1.29, 95% CI [0.99, 1.69]). Both sources of support were strongly associated with lower odds of incident depression (OR 0.33, 95% CI [0.20, 0.55] and OR 0.49, 95% CI [0.30, 0.79], respectively). We did not find associations with vigorous physical activity or sleep duration. Conclusions Social support is important to the physical and mental health of new mothers and may promote behaviors that limit postpartum weight retention. 2019 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/81105 10.1186/s12905-019-0839-6 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ BioMed Central fulltext |
| spellingShingle | Millar, Lynne Faleschini, S Rifas-Shiman, S. Skouteris, H Hivert, M. Oken, E Women’s perceived social support: Associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms |
| title | Women’s perceived social support: Associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms |
| title_full | Women’s perceived social support: Associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms |
| title_fullStr | Women’s perceived social support: Associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms |
| title_full_unstemmed | Women’s perceived social support: Associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms |
| title_short | Women’s perceived social support: Associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms |
| title_sort | women’s perceived social support: associations with postpartum weight retention, health behaviors and depressive symptoms |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/81105 |