Promoting Mother-Baby Bonding

The aims of this study are to determine if: 1. during pregnancy, a progressive muscle relaxation and abdominal touch ritual involving a pleasing scent (i.e. a "relaxation ritual") can, acutely, reduce maternal stress and affect the fetus (in terms of movement, changes in heart rate and heart rate variability); 2. a progressive muscle relaxation and abdominal touch ritual involving a pleasing scent (i.e. a "relaxation ritual") during pregnancy can have an effect on mitochondria functioning in the placenta through reducing maternal stress during pregnancy (based on our recent findings (Monk et al, 2016)); 3. the scent will come to function as a conditioned stimulus such that exposure to the scent postpartum will induce greater maternal relaxation, which will have an effect on the mother-infant interaction and infant physiology; 4. prenatal maternal exposure to scent combined with abdominal touch will lead to mothers' increased likelihood of utilizing infant massage with a lotion of the same scent postpartum; 5. the prenatal ritual and the increased likelihood of engaging in infant massage will lead to a maternal perception of greater mother-infant bonding, attachment and parenting efficacy, and improved maternal mood; 6. the prenatal ritual and the increased likelihood of engaging in infant massage will lead to improved performance on the conjugate reinforcement paradigm conditioning task administered to infants at 4 months of age