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Publication #FAR0301

Going Back to Work After Baby is Born1

Kate Fogarty2

Once a baby is born, deciding the best time to return to work can be emotional and difficult. Parents often wrestle with questions, such as how daily separation might affect the attachment relationship or the mutual, warm, enduring bond between an infant and his or her caregiver.

As more moms are devoting time to their careers, babies are spending more time with caregivers who aren't their parents, and it's well known that babies develop attachments to fathers, siblings, grandparents, and even caregivers outside the home. Still, infants up to one year old, show a preference for a primary caregiver (Bowlby, 1969), especially when they are distressed (Lamb, 1997).

According to a nationwide study done by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (1997), no attachment differences were found between infants who had received nonmaternal child care over much of their first year of life and those who were cared for primarily by their mothers. Infants separated from their mothers were similarly upset, regardless of whether most of the care they received came from their mothers, fathers, other relatives, or nonrelatives inside or outside the home. What was shown to be related to attachment insecurity in this study was mother's insensitivity to infant's needs, combined with poor child care or frequent changes in child care. So, for parents who worry that their baby won't love them as much if they work, with quality child care and your loving attention, you should be just fine.

Listening, learning, and living together: it's the science of life. "Family Album" is a co-production of University of Florida IFAS Extension, the Department of Family, Youth and Community Sciences and of WUFT-FM. If you'd like to learn more, please visit our Web site at http://www.familyalbumradio.org.

To listen to the radio broadcast:

http://www.radiosource.net/radio_stories/goingback.mp3

http://www.radiosource.net/radio_stories/goingback.wav

References

Berk, L. E. (2004). Development through the lifespan. (3rd ed.). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss: Vol. 1, Attachment. New York: Basic Books

Lamb, M. E. (1997). The development of father-infant relationships. In M.E. Lamb (Ed.), The role of the father in child development (3rd ed., pp. 104-120). New York: Wiley.

National Institute for Child Health and Development (NICHD), Early Child Care Research Network. (1997). The effects of infant child care on infant-mother attachment security: Results of the NICHFD Study of Early Child Care. Child Development, 68, 860-879.

National Institute for Child Health and Development (NICHD), Early Child Care Research Network. (1998). Early child care and self-control, compliance, and problem behavior at twenty-four and thirty-six months. Child Development, 69, 1145-1170.

National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), Early Child Care Research Network. (1999). Child care and mother-child interaction in the first 3 years of life. Developmental Psychology, 35, 1399-1413.

National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), Early Child Care Research Network. (2000). The relation of child care to cognitive and language development. Child Development, 71, 960-980.

Pederson, D.R., Gleason, K.E., Moran, G., & Bento, S. (1998). Maternal attachment and representations, maternal sensitivity, and the infant-mother attachment relationship. Developmental Psychology, 34, 925-933.

Stifter, C.A., Coulehan, C.M., & Fish, M. (1993). Linking employment to attachment: The mediating effects of maternal separation anxiety and interactive behavior. Child Development, 64, 1451-1460.

Footnotes

1.

This document is FAR0301, one of a series of the Department of Family, Youth and Community Sciences, Florida Cooperative Extension Service, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of Florida. First published January 2008. In the interest of time or clarity, the broadcast version of this script may have been modified. Please visit the EDIS Web site at http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu.

2.

Kate Fogarty, assistant professor, Department of Family, Youth and Community Sciences, Cooperative Extension Service, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611.

The Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS) is an Equal Opportunity Institution authorized to provide research, educational information and other services only to individuals and institutions that function with non-discrimination with respect to race, creed, color, religion, age, disability, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, national origin, political opinions or affiliations. For more information on obtaining other extension publications, contact your county Cooperative Extension service.

U.S. Department of Agriculture, Cooperative Extension Service, University of Florida, IFAS, Florida A. & M. University Cooperative Extension Program, and Boards of County Commissioners Cooperating. Millie Ferrer-Chancy, Interim Dean.