The emotional and intellectual development of children is modelled, inter alias, by early experiments and emotional climate provided by interpersonal environment, through mother-infants interactions. It is now proven that, for example, a mother or a father presenting a postnatal depression (PND) can interfere with the correct operation of those processes, with, as a consequence, a possible impairment of child's development.

The interactive patterns which develops between a mother and her baby begin during pregnancy, continue developing and become more and more structured during the first months postpartum.

This symposium will go through different aspects of parental psychopathology which can occur during pregnancy and post-partum. Different models for the study of mother-infant interactions will be as well presented and discussed.