One of the research areas in mother-child health has focused on examining which are the signs inmothers' psychological functioning that would lead to a further disturbed development in an infant.The perspective of this paper has deviated from this research area. Natural observation of an infantduring his/her first year of life suggests that early mother-child affective bonding grows and strengthens progressively, even mother's behavior is not totally adequate. This article al so suggests that mother and child feed back each other in this early bonding. / Una de las líneas de investigación en salud materno-infantil se ha interesado en investigar cuáles son los indicadores del funcionamiento psicológico de las madres que llevarían a un desarrollo posterior perturbado del infante. La perspectiva del presente trabajo se distancia de esta línea de investigación. La observación natural de un infante durante el primer año de su vida, nos permite sugerir que el vínculo temprano entre una madre y su bebé se va gestando y consolidando progresivamente,más allá que el funcionamiento de la madre no sea del todo adecuado. Se sugiere además que en este vínculo afectivo temprano, la madre y el bebé se retroalimentan mutuamente.

The research problem of the thesis undertakes psychological aspects of carrying an infant on a mother's body using a sling or carrier. The research question states: What are the motives of mothers to carry their infant in carrying aid, according to opinions of mothers who carry their babies? The theoretical part discusses psychological findings about an early mother-child relationship in terms of contact and emerging bonds (attachment) from a prenatal period, through perinatal period, and up to one year of an infant's age. More attention has been paid to biological, behavioural, anthropological, and especially psychological assumptions for carrying an infant by its mother. A qualitative research method has been chosen for the emphirical part of the thesis. The data has been obtained by means of semi-structured interview conducted with nineteen respondents that have had experiences with carrying an infant. The respondents have been selected by an improbability selection method. The recorded interviews have been transcribed verbatim and analysed using a grounded theory. Among the most common motives for carrying a child include pleasurable feelings and experiences of mothers; especially feelings of naturalness, tranquillity, security, and freedom. Furthermore, the mothers appreciate the practicality...

The thesis is aimed at perinatal factors affecting the emotional bond between a mother and a child (boding) during the first weeks postpartum. The literature review is divided into three chapters. The first chapter discusses the childbirth, the experience of childbirth and the factors affecting a subjective evaluation of the childbirth by a parturient. The second chapter follows up with an overview of findings concerning the initial afterbirth moments, and the interaction between a mother and a child during early contact. The third chapter introduces the concept of bonding. It describes its manifestations, possible measuring methods, and factors influencing its quality. The research part analyzes perinatal factors affecting bonding on a sample of 1108 mothers with the use of generalized linear regression. The independent variables are: mode of birth, the evaluation of childbirth experience by mother, and the process of early contact between a mother and a child. The results show that bonding during the first weeks postpartum was not affected by the mode of birth or by the parturient's evaluation of the childbirth experience. A significant effect was found in the occurrence of early contact between a mother and a child; mothers who had contact with the child during the first postpartum hour reported...