Psychosocial factors and physical health during the first year of life. Children in a new Stockholm suburb. A prospective longitudinal study. III.

The study is part of a longitudinal research project of a cohort of 501 children in a Stockholm suburb. The aim of the project is to clarify the relation between the children's health and development and their home environment. The present work deals with the children's physical health during their first year of life and comparisons were made between infants in families suffering or not suffering from psychosocial stress. Indications of psychosocial stress in the homes include reports of alcohol abuse, mental disease or criminality in one or both of the parents. Judging by reports from child welfare centres and hospital records, children from homes with psychosocial stress do not have a higher rate of somatic illnesses, retarded psychomotor development and psychosomatic problems than the control children.