Pre-and Post-natal maternal stress and/or psychopathology can have negative effects on infant temperament and later toddler behavior (Buitelaar, Huizink, Mulder, Robles de Medina, & Visser, 2003; Gutteling et al., 2005; Whitaker, Orzol, & Kahn, 2006). Infant temperamental difficulties, such as shyness or emotional lability, have been associated with later behaviors problems as children develop (Olson, Bates, Sandy, & Lanthier, 2000; Olson, Bates, Sandy, & Schilling, 2002). In particular, infant emotionality and emotional reactivity has been suggested as an early precursor to externalizing problems in children (Crockenberg, 2005).

The goal of this research study is to explore the links and potential pathways between maternal perinatal depression and adverse infant and toddler behavior problems.

The present study utilizes data from a high-risk community sample and explores the links between maternal stress and depression during pregnancy and postpartum predicting to their infants’ emotion regulation problems at 7 months of age. On a smaller subset we further explore the associations between early emotion regulation problems and subsequent development of pre-school behavior problems.

We found that both maternal postpartum depression and problematic bonding uniquely predict problematic infant temperament at 7-months, and that in turn, infant emotion regulation problems were predictive of higher scores of toddler behavior problems 12 months later.

Our preliminary data confirms that infant emotionality (in the context of maternal psychopathology and problematic bonding) may be an early precursor to the development of later toddler behavior problems.