"Your Stress Is My Stress": A Dyadic Study on Adoptive and Biological First-Time Parents

Parenting stress during first years after the transition to parenthood has been linked to depression, anxiety, and children's well-being. What about the role of partner's level of stress in influencing the level of stress of the other member of the couple? Research on dyadic data is still limited about both adoptive and biological parents. The present longitudinal study was aimed at (a) comparing adoptive and biological couples' dyadic correlations (intraclass correlation coefficients) within 3 months from the child's arrival/birth (T1) and 1 year later (T2) and evaluating if intraclass correlation coefficients were stable or changed over time and (b) measuring interdependence within couples, applying the actor-partner interdependence model. Participants were 36 adoptive and 31 biological couples, all first-time parents, for a total of 134 subjects. Both parents within each couple were asked to fill in a self-report questionnaire. Results evidenced similarities and differences among adoptive and biological parents and a higher interdependence within the adoptive couples.