Conference Proceedings - School of Nursing & Midwifery - Trinity ...

School of Nursing & Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin: 8 th Annual Interdisciplinary Research Conference
Transforming Healthcare Through Research, Education & Technology: 7 th – 9 th November 2007
Conference Proceedings
Longrobucco and Freston 1989; Raphael-Leff, 1991). Others
propose a relationship with anxiety (Trethowan and Conlon 1965;
Lukesch 1977; Bogren 1983; Strickland 1987; Brown, 1988).
To date only one study by Storey et al (2000) support a biological
basis for the syndrome. There is a dearth of studies for many of
these theories except those examining the syndrome’s relationship
with pregnancy involvement, role preparation and anxiety. Those
which have been done demonstrate disparate findings arising
mainly from some of the methodological problems mentioned
earlier.
Study Aim
The aim of the study is to investigate the type, severity and distress
and time frame of physical and psychological symptoms of the
Couvade syndrome in an experimental group of men with pregnant
partners during the first and third trimesters of pregnancy and four
weeks into the postpartum period. This group is compared with a
control group of men whose partners are not pregnant measured
over a 3 and 6-month comparative time periods.
Study Objectives
� To compare differences in the type and incidence of physical
and psychological symptoms experienced by men with pregnant
partners compared to those with non-expectant partners.
� To assess the severity and distress of physical and
psychological symptoms experienced by men with pregnant
partners compared to those with non-expectant partners.
� To compare the impact of time upon symptom severity and
distress for both study groups.
� To assess the relationship between socio-demographic variables
with symptom severity and distress.
Design
This is the second phase of the study deploying a prospective
design (Figure I). The study whilst observing control of variables
could not randomly allocate the participants to experimental and
control groups for obvious reasons. A number of strengths justify
the selection of the design for this phase of the investigation. It is
ideally suited to the time requirements of the study spanning over
the course of pregnancy and four weeks into the postpartum period.
It enables symptoms to be monitored in terms of their
presence/absence, levels of severity and distress, and duration and
variability over time as opposed to a snapshot view as with a crosssectional
design. Hoskins and Mariano (2004) argue that
longitudinal designs enable more realistic variations of the
phenomenon being studied across time unlike cross-sectional
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