Features of social development and emotional well-being among preschool children conceived with assisted reproductive technologies

Abstract

Introduction. An important aspect of modern preschool education is the social development and emotional well-being of children. Regarding children born as a result of ART, there is a lack and inconsistency of data on psychosocial development and well-being. The research objective is to identify the features of social development and emotional well-being in children conceived with ART, in comparison with children born from natural pregnancy (during preschool childhood). Materials and methods. The data of a Prospective Longitudinal Interdisciplinary Study (PLIS) of Child Development after the child reaches the age of 4 years were used. The sample consisted of 90 children born with ART, and 130 children born from natural pregnancy (NP). The scale "Prosocial behavior" from test "Behavior of your child" (BEH), the scale "Communicative problems" from the Checklist for Autism in Toddlers methodology; the scales "Positive attitude to others", "Problems of behavior in society" and "Emotional well-being" from the test "Your child is at home" were used. Methods of data analysis: U-Mann-Whitney test; correlation analysis (r-Spearman), etc. Results. The majority of ART and NP children are characterized by pronounced prosocial behavior, positive attitude towards others, absence of demonstrated behavior problems in society and problems in communication with other people, emotional well-being. Nevertheless, problems of behavior in society prevail (U=4153.5; p=0.05) in ART children. There were no differences between boys and girls (p>0.05). Regardless of the type of conception, two significantly different (p≤0.05) cluster groups were identified: (1) with more pronounced prosocial behavior, positive attitude to others and emotional well-being, less pronounced behavior problems in society, (2) with less pronounced prosocial behavior and positive attitude to others, with emotional distress, more pronounced problems of behavior in society. In children with ART, cluster groups differed (p≤0.05) in the severity of communication problems. In both groups, indicators of prosocial behavior, positive attitude to others, problems of behavior in society and emotional well-being are interrelated (p≤0.05). In the NP group (unlike ART), communication problems are associated with all indicators, except for a positive attitude towards others. Conclusion. The features of social development and emotional well-being of children conceived with ART in comparison with children with NP (during preschool childhood) are revealed, individual variants and possible trajectories of children's development are shown, which will allow to more accurately determine the targets of psychological and pedagogical impact and make assistance to children and families who have used ART more effective, differentiated and purposeful.