ADAPTATION TO PARENTHOOD OF MEXICAN-AMERICAN FIRST-TIME MOTHERS AND FATHERS.
Contributors: University of Minnesota.
Published: 1996
Number of pages: 198
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.; Sociology, Individual and Family Studies.; Anthropology, Cultural.
Description: An ethnographic approach was used to develop knowledge from the perspective of Mexican American first-time mothers and fathers about parental concerns, the meaning of family health in their own words, and health-related decisions they faced in their first six months of parenting. The conceptual framework for the study was Sr. Callista Roy's model of the family as an adaptive system.

The study was conducted in Hidalgo County, Texas. Twenty-six families were followed longitudinally with an average of eight (SD = 1.8) home visits per family. Audiotaped conversations with participants were transcribed verbatim as recorded in either Spanish or English. Spanish transcripts were then translated to English and both were checked for accuracy by a local consultant.

Salient parental concerns derived from content analysis were identified: infant illness, providing for the material needs of the infant, knowing how to rear an infant, and facing job loss. A characteristic health-related decision of 96% of families was following la cuarentena, a family ritual of 40 days duration in which fathers were responsible for the housework while mothers stayed home, adhered to a prescribed diet, and learned infant care from their mother or mother-in-law.

Parents defined family health as family unity. Metaphorical assertions about family health were identified: the couple was the headboard of the family; the house stood by way of both (parents); and parents went on growing daily with the child seeing how to carry on the routine of life, and together adapting themselves.

Implications for nursing practice included nurses being cognizant of la cuarentena, including both fathers and mothers in family health teaching while allowing extended family members to attend parenting classes.

Further study is indicated to identify the distinctive nature of adaptive processes of socialization, nurturing, and support in the Mexican American family so that nurses can design nursing interventions to promote adaptive processes in the family, thereby enhancing adaptation to parenthood for Mexican American first-time parents.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 57-06, Section: B, page: 3658.

Thesis (PH.D.)--UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA, 1996.

School code: 0130.