The Impact of Working Conditions on Postpartum Depressive Symptoms and Family Relations: Re-evaluated in Light of the COVID-19 Pandemic

There are indications that working conditions play a role in postpartum mental health and family relations. These include precarious working conditions, psychosocial work stress, and work-privacy conflict. However, these findings mainly come from cross-sectional studies conducted in the United States. To further investigate these first indications, the Dresden Study on Parenting, Work, and Mental Health (DREAM) was developed. It is a German, longitudinal, multi-method cohort study. DREAM has various sub-studies, including DREAMCORONA and DREAMCORONA-TALK, developed to investigate the experiences of (expectant) parents during the COVID-19 pandemic (e.g., isolation, school and daycare closures, working from home) and its impact on family health and relationships. With its sub-studies, DREAM can compare working conditions and related health outcomes of families before and during the pandemic. DREAM results revealed that most pre-pandemic issues stayed relevant during the pandemic. For instance, psychosocial work stress was identified as a risk factor for postpartum depression, both before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, the pandemic revealed new issues like a higher prevalence of depression, which was shown to have a negative impact on parent-child bonding during the pandemic. Regarding parents’ relationship satisfaction, we found no decrease from pre-pandemic times up to the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in December 2020. Moreover, DREAMCORONA revealed that gender equal role distributions can facilitate mothers’ relationship satisfaction. To summarize, DREAM showed what work-related factors need to be addressed to support family health and happiness, during and after a pandemic.