Stress, anxiety, fatigue and other psychosocial characteristics may influence the food choices women make during pregnancy, according to a study by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. A mother's diet can affect the healthy development of her fetus and the health of her newborn.
The study, the first to examine the affect of psychosocial factors on diet during pregnancy, appears in the June 2005 issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association .
"Our findings suggest that women who are more fatigued, stressed and anxious eat more food, particularly carbohydrates. While eating more food led to an increase in some important micronutrients, it also led to a decrease in others, like folate and vitamin C," said the study's corresponding author, Laura Caulfield , PhD, an associate professor at the Bloomberg School of Public Health's Center for Human Nutrition . "Psychosocial factors should be considered when counseling women with regard to diet during pregnancy."
For the study, the researchers assessed the dietary intake and psychosocial characteristics of 134 women who had low-risk, normal pregnancies. The psychosocial factors examined included stress, anxiety, depressed mood, anger, fatigue and social support.