Conceptual and empirical advances in our understanding about the relationship with the unborn baby, and their implications for practice

Presented by Professor Jane Barlow

This webinar was presented live on Wednesday June 7th, 2023 at 4pm US Eastern time. Through the kindness of Professor Barlow, a recording of the webinar is available here

Professor Jane Barlow

This paper examines the key concepts developed over the past forty years and the most recent empirical evidence with regard to the mother’s relationship with the unborn baby.  The first past of the paper depicts the key concepts, their theoretical origins, and what the evidence suggests in terms of the concordance between the prenatal relationship and parenting in the postnatal period. The second part of the paper examines the implications of this evidence with regard to the focus of prenatal interventions, and summarises the findings of the most recent evidence in terms of what works to improve the mother’s relationship with the unborn baby in both low and high risk pregnant women.

Jane Barlow (DPhil, FFPH Hon) is Professor of Evidence Based Intervention and Policy Evaluation at the Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford. Jane’s research focuses on developing and evaluating dyadic interventions during the perintal period that are aimed at promoting infant mental health and reducing later health and social inequalities. She also undertakes research to evaluate the effectiveness of interventions aimed at preventing child abuse and is director of the Leverhulme Biopsychosocial Doctoral Training programme.  She is currently President of AIMH UK, Affiliate Council Representative of the Executive Board of WAIMH,  an Associate Editor for the Infant Mental Health Journal, and was a member of PreVAiL (Preventing Violence Across the Lifespan).

Link to publications: https://www.spi.ox.ac.uk/people/professor-jane-barlow#tab-3635666

A recording of the webinar is available here.