The finnish family competence study: Characteristics of pregnant women with low childbirth knowledge

The present paper characterizes the socio-demographic background, health behaviour and attitudes of 1443 nulliparous women in relation to their level of childbirth knowledge. The response rate was 92%. Those women who refused to participate were not significantly occupationally different from the study subjects. Practically all pregnant women in Finland use maternity health care services. However, those with a low childbirth knowledge needed more health counselling and were largely characterized by the same factors that identify mothers in other countries who do not use such services. This finding emphasizes the importance of a wide coverage of antenatal care. Mothers with low childbirth knowledge were more often than those with high knowledge, unemployed, somewhat younger, living near or with their parents, and less well educated. They felt that they had had no education in child rearing, but they also felt no need for such guidance. They smoked more than mothers with high knowledge both before and during pregnancy. They had less physical exercise, ate more fatty foods and less vegetables. They also used more drugs during the first trimester of pregnancy and had fewer leisure time activities, read fewer books and used fewer cultural services. They assessed themselves as emotionally closer to their own mothers than did those with high childbirth knowledge. A low level of childbirth knowledge seems to be associated with risks in health-connected behaviour, which has important implications for prenatal health education.