Abstract
Objective
Our aim was to explain the motivational structure that accompanies the decision by mothers who breastfeed for more than two years.
Methods
Qualitative study in urban and rural women aged 20 to 44 years in the communes of Temuco and Padre Las Casas, Chile. The data collection technique was an in-depth interview. The inductive method of analysis based on Grounded Theory enabled a constant comparative process until the theoretical saturation of the data and the 3 coding stages: open, axial and selective.
Results
Eight women agreed to participate. Four dimensions were identified: life experience, maternal self-analysis, stimuli from the mother herself and from the child, and social and cultural stimuli, which underlie the motivational structure that accompanies the decision by mothers to continue breastfeeding for longer than two years. In childhood the motivations are mainly intrinsic (family culture of breastfeeding) and in adulthood there are intrinsic motivations (maternal feelings, mother’s internal stimuli) and transcendent motivations (stimuli from the child), with these being reinforced by stimuli originating from the social and cultural milieu (family surroundings).
Conclusion
For a woman, childhood is the motivational period par excellence to integrate breastfeeding as the best option for feeding her children. In adulthood, the transcendent motivation is consolidated in the first stage of child-rearing, affording greater motivational quality to the prolongation of breastfeeding. Public policies must focus their actions on these stages of a woman’s life to improve breastfeeding indicators.
Breastfeeding; Child-mother relations; Feeding behavior
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