Maternal expectations about infant development of preterm and fullterm infants: a cross-national comparison

In three European regions (The Netherlands, Northern Italy and Southern Italy) we investigated whether mothers of healthy preterm infants (n=92) adjust their expectations for the timing of developmental milestones in the first years of life as compared to mothers of fullterm infants (n=140). We examined whether these adjustments could be seen as reflecting a pessimistic view, as would be predicted from the "prematurity stereotype" perspective. Partial corrections for prematurity were regularly made, but no indications were found for an overly pessimistic view. Moreover, the differences between the regions in the anticipated timing of mastery of milestones were larger than the effects of prematurity.