| Budget Amount *help |
¥10,700,000 (Direct Cost: ¥10,700,000)
Fiscal Year 2002: ¥2,500,000 (Direct Cost: ¥2,500,000)
Fiscal Year 2001: ¥2,300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥2,300,000)
Fiscal Year 2000: ¥5,900,000 (Direct Cost: ¥5,900,000)
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| Research Abstract |
Questionnaire study on facilitating and restricting factors of milk-feeding and weaning were administered in Japan, United States, and France. this international comparative study is still under way because of a delay in an approval from the Ethical Committee of Michigan State University, Some other studies with an interview, a questionnaire, or a diary were also carried out in Japan. Those include a nation-wide survey of practices of practices of professional advice given to mothers in the Health Centers, a nation-wide survey of feeding and weaning practices in the mothers of 3-year-olds, comparison of feeding practices in the first-born and second-born children, longitudinal changes in the practice of feeding with infants' development, an interview of mothers' perception of breasts in terms of sexuality and nursing. The main results of these studies are : breast milk is perceived as ideal for psychological as well as nutritional and immunological reasons by mothers ; hence mothers concern much about the amount, and its insufficiency is a major cause of early weaning and their stress in child-rearing ; feeding style is related with their belief of child-rearing, successive child-rearing may cause modification in feeding ; husbands could be a restricting factor because breast bears conflicting functions of nursing and sexuality. Milk-feeding and weaning are thus considered as complex processes based not only on mother-infant relations, but also on their relations with other family members, specialists, and the presence of formula. The main results were reported in the symposium at the 14^<th> annual meeting of the Japan Society of Developmental Psychology in 2003. The report will be published when the data collection of the United States is completed.
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