Representações sociais do pré-natal para os homens que vivenciaram as consultas da companheira

Abstract

Background: traditionally, men occupy the role of financial provider for the family, distancing themselves from their child's development. However, new scientific evidence highlights male involvement in antenatal care as indispensable for paternity, establishment, and strengthening of the bond between father and baby, the child's mental health, and the woman's well-being. Aim: to analyze the Social representations attributed to male involvement in antenatal care. Method: this is a descriptive exploratory research, of qualitative approach, using the Social representation theory, in its' structural aspect, with the Central Nucleus Theory. The sample consisted of 38 men who attended their partner's antenatal consultations in a maternity school located in the state of Rio Grande do Norte, from January to November 2020. For data collection, a sociodemographic questionnaire, a themed drawing-story, and the Free Word Association Technique with the inductive term “father and antenatal consultations" were used. Data analysis used the Interface software for the Multidimensional Analyzes by Textes et de Questionnaires, version 7 alpha 2, through prototypical processing for the matrix, automatically calculated; intermediate frequency (± 5.67) and Average Evocation (± 2.8). The research has the approval of the Research Ethics Committee of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, under the Certificate of Presentation for Ethical Appreciation (CAAE) number 21360719.0.0000.5537. Results: the participants were mostly men ages 29 to 38 years (44.7%; n = 17) living in the countryside of Rio Grande do Norte (52.6%; n = 20). Among them, 55.3% (n = 21) said they already had another child, not conceived with their current partner (61.9%; n = 13). In this context, they had participated in their previous partner antenatal care (57.1%; n = 12). The prototypical analysis found that the term-inducer resulted in 190 evocations and 99 distinct words. After stemming and categorization, the number of discrepant words evoked by the participating men was 65. Excluding evocations less than three times, 21.5% were used. The generated matrix displayed the possible representation of male's involvement in antenatal care and was crystallized, mainly and semantically, by the terms love (f = 16; OME: 2) and responsibility (f = 14; OME: 2.4), in the central nucleus of the four-house framework. Terms which constituted the first periphery were: good (f = 15; OME: 3.1); attention (f = 14; OME: 3.1); presence (f = 12; OME: 3.7) and affection (f = 11; OME: 3.4), while the second periphery was formed by the terms: happiness (f = 7; OME: 3.4); monitoring (f = 7; OME: 3.3); important (f = 6; OME: 4); anxiety (f = 4; OME: 3.2); wait (f = 3; OME: 4.3) and health (f = 3; OME: 3.3) and, finally, the contrast zone was formed by the following terms: family (f = 5; OME: 1.6) and preparation (f = 3; OME: 2). Conclusion: this research found that the Social Representations of men who participated in the partner's antenatal consultations revealed feelings, as well as general meanings such as “wear the identity of a father even before the birth of the child”, which direct the core of meanings towards love, established and strengthened throughout the partner's pregnancy.