The quality of family interactions and marital satisfaction from pregnancy to the child’s age of 10 years: A preliminary report

Family-level interactions became over last years one of the main focus of developmental and clinical research in developmental psychology and psychopathology. Since the demonstration of the emergence of triadic competences at the child’s 12 weeks of life, the role of triadic interactions in family functioning have been observed from different theoretical and methodological approaches, usually focusing on newborn families and the early infancy of the child. In this work, we will present a preliminary report about the development of the quality of family interactions and marital satisfaction, from pregnancy to the child’s age of 10 years. Family interactions were assessed on 14 non-referred families using the Lausanne Trilogue Play (LTP) paradigm and marital adjustment was assessed using the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (DAS). Results show that family interactions improve from pregnancy until the 9 month and then remain stable until school age. The mother’s perception of marital satisfaction, instead, continuously decreases over time.