New research indicates that the language hospital staff use to describe a fetus during an ultrasound can significantly influence how parents relate to and care for their child after birth, either positively or negatively.
According to the recent study the language and words used by medical staff during pregnancy ultrasounds can deeply influence how mothers perceive their unborn babies—and, in turn, impact their parenting and the child’s emotional development after birth.
For example, if an ultrasound’s poor quality is blamed on an “uncooperative” fetus, it might set the stage for less-invested parenting, the study suggests.
“The words used in these conversations with ultrasound technicians or obstetric sonographers — whom we consider experts on fetal development — get absorbed and influence who you think your child is before they’re even born,” explained study lead author Kaylin Hill.
She’s an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.
She told “Our research suggests the descriptions offered by prenatal care providers stick with parents,” she said in a university news release. “When we asked prospective parents to describe their baby, 70% of them indicated their perception was related to a prenatal care visit.”
The findings were published recently in Communications Psychology.
The study involved 320 pregnant women, interviewed between their third and ninth months of pregnancy. These mothers were later followed up when their children reached 18 months of age to assess behavioral and emotional patterns in the children.
Findings showed that mothers who maintained a positive perception of their unborn child during pregnancy were less likely to report emotional or behavioral issues in their children. In contrast, those who viewed their unborn babies negatively—due to how the child was described during ultrasounds—reported higher rates of sleep disturbances, emotional detachment, and mood swings in their toddlers.
In an experiment conducted with 161 of the study participants, women were told by an ultrasound technician that an ultrasound was of poor quality.
The issue was described in one of three ways: Technical issues were to blame; the fetus was “uncooperative” during the procedure (leading to a poor-quality ultrasound); or no worries, a follow-up ultrasound might produce a better result.
When their fetus was described as “uncooperative,” moms tended to later view their baby in more negative terms, compared to the other two scenarios.
“Of course we want to help support parents,” Hill said, “and this research suggests a first step may be to talk with health care providers, to highlight the importance of these seemingly small differences in word choice during salient moments with pregnant patients.”
She said these early impressions might also be a minor but crucial ingredient in a woman’s odds for postpartum depression.
“One of the highest risk periods for depression is the perinatal period, where individuals are experiencing changes across so many levels of functioning — physical, psychological and social,” Hill said.
“If an ultrasound experience is impacting how an individual sees their child, that could potentially influence aspects of the caregiving relationship, which is really important for both parent and child outcomes over time,” she added.
