Abstract
Healthy behaviors in pregnant women have a major effect on pregnancy outcomes; however, only few studies have explored the relationship of multiple psychosocial factors with healthy lifestyles during pregnancy. The objective of this study was to investigate whether the five psychosocial factors of anxiety, stress, depression, marital dissatisfaction, and social support are associated with six domains of healthy lifestyles in pregnant women, including nutrition, physical activity, health responsibility, stress management, interpersonal relationships, and self-actualization. In this cross-sectional study, 445 pregnant women from the obstetrics clinics of the teaching hospitals of Babol University of Medical Sciences were included. The subjects answered six questionnaires, including the Health-Promoting Lifestyle Profile, Beck Depression Inventory, Prenatal Distress Questionnaire, State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, Social Support Questionnaire, and Marital Satisfaction Scale. We developed a series of simple linear regression models based on each subscale of lifestyle (nutrition, physical activity, health responsibility, stress management, interpersonal relationships, and self-actualization) as the dependent variables and the five psychological variables (anxiety, stress, depression, marital dissatisfaction, and social support) as the independent variables. State and trait anxieties were the strongest negative predictors of all aspects of a healthy lifestyle. Furthermore, depression was negatively associated with all of the six subscales of a healthy lifestyle. Pregnancy-specific stress was the only negative predictor of stress management and self-actualization. Marital dissatisfaction was negatively associated with nutrition, stress management, health responsibility, and self-actualization. Social support had negative and positive associations with healthy behaviors. The study suggests that more attention should be paid to identifying the psychological risk factors in pregnancy in addition to providing suitable interventions for improving the lifestyle of pregnant women.
Highlights
Lifestyle is a popular concept that is often used to describe the choices people make with regard to their consumption patterns
We developed a series of simple linear regression models based on each subscale of lifestyle as the dependent variables and the five psychological variables as the independent variables in the two-series analysis
The analysis of variance (ANOVA) test revealed that there was no significant difference among the mean scores of the three groups of pregnant women based on three time points
Summary
Lifestyle is a popular concept that is often used to describe the choices people make with regard to their consumption patterns. Healthy lifestyles are patterns of self-initiated behaviors and perceptions that serve to maintain or enhance the level of well-being of individuals. These behaviors consist of six domains: nutrition, physical activity, health responsibility, stress management, interpersonal relationships, and self-actualization [2]. In 1995, Deluca and Lobel defined healthy and unhealthy behaviors during pregnancy by using four domains: nutrition, exercise, smoking, and substance abuse [3]. The healthy behaviors of pregnant women affect their pregnancy outcomes. Studies have shown that both stress and stress management are important factors affecting pregnancy outcomes [8,9,10,11]
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