Abstract
BackgroundMaternal mental health including postpartum mental health is essential to women’s health. This study aimed to develop a specific measure for assessing postpartum depression literacy and consequently evaluate its psychometric properties among a sample of perinatal women.MethodsThis investigation was composed of two studies: developing the measure, and evaluating of psychometric properties of the developed questionnaire. In development stage an item pool was created. Then, based on definition of mental health literacy and preliminary screening, an initial questionnaire was developed. The content and face validity of the questionnaire were then assessed. In the second study psychometric properties of the questionnaire were examined. Overall 692 perinatal women with the mean age of 27.63 years (ranging from 17 to 43) participated in the study.ResultsIn all an item pool of 86 items was generated. Of these, 31 items were removed and the remaining 55 items subjected to content and face validity and further 16 items removed. In the second stage a 39-item questionnaire namely the Postpartum Depression Literacy Scale (PoDLis) was evaluated. In principal component factor analysis, 31 items were loaded indicating a 7-factor solution for the questionnaire. The factors designated the following constructs: ability to recognize postpartum depression, knowledge of risk factors and causes, knowledge and belief of self-care activities, knowledge about professional help available, beliefs about professional help available, attitudes which facilitate recognition of postpartum depression and appropriate help-seeking, and knowledge of how to seek information related to postpartum depression. Finally performing the confirmatory factor analysis, the Postpartum Depression Literacy Scale with 31 items was supported for the structures suggested by theoretical model and findings from the exploratory factor analysis. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for the scale was .78 and it ranged from .70 to .83 for each factor lending support to the internal consistency of the questionnaire.ConclusionThe findings suggest that the Postpartum Depression Literacy Scale (PoDLiS) is a reliable and valid instrument for measuring the postpartum depression literacy and now can be used in studies of mental health literacy in women.
Highlights
Maternal mental health including postpartum mental health is essential to women’s health
Exploratory factor structure After confirming the adequacy of the sampling based on the KMO and Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity (KMO = .783) and χ2 (741, n = 447) = 4449, P < .001, 11 factors emerged with eigenvalues of greater than 1, which accounted for 60.63% of the variance observed
Reliability The Cornbrash’s alpha coefficient for the Postpartum Depression Literacy Scale was .78 and for ability to recognize postpartum depression was .77 and for risk factors and causes, knowledge and beliefs of self-care activities, knowledge about professional help available, beliefs about professional help available, attitudes which facilitate recognition of postpartum depression and appropriate help-seeking and knowledge of how to seek information related to postpartum depression were .76, 78, .83, .78, .70, .73, respectively
Summary
Maternal mental health including postpartum mental health is essential to women’s health. Postpartum depression is a common problem among women [1, 2]. Postpartum depression can negatively impact the health and well-being of the mother and babies. Usually most women do not proactively seek professional help for signs and symptoms of depression during the postpartum period, even if treatment is offered and accessible [5,6,7]. The lack of knowledge about signs and symptoms of depression and treatment possibilities, have been considered as a major help-seeking barrier during the postpartum period [5, 6], indicating how significant is the role of women’s depression literacy in the help-seeking process [8]. Providing the knowledge and skills are essential for women to recognize postpartum depression and obtain efficient treatment [9]. Postpartum depression literacy may be conceived as a particular type of mental health literacy, defined as the knowledge and beliefs about mental health disorders that aid their recognition, management or prevention [8]
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