The effect of child-birth class on first-time fathers' psychological responses

The purpose of this study was to examine fathers' psychological responses to labor/delivery over time and to evaluate the effect of child-birth class on the father. A quasi-experimental and exploratory study was conducted with data collected at the 36th and the 39th weeks of pregnancy, and the first day of the postpartum period. 100 married, first-time expectant fathers in both the experimental and control groups were drawn from one medical center in southern Taiwan as a convenient sample. Three two-hour sessions of childbirth class, each lasting for one day, were conducted consecutively following the first data point for the experimental group. The "Chinese Health Questionnaire" and Zung's Self-rating Anxiety and Self-rating Depression Scales were used to obtain the first-time fathers' health status, anxiety, and depression scores at each data point. The two-way ANOVA with repeated measures was used to compare the means of psychological responses between experimental and control groups at each point in time. The main effect of classes on paternal health status, anxiety, and depression of the experimental group was not found and the limitations of the study were discussed.