Infant Feeding Practices and Social Support Networks Among Immigrant Chinese American Mothers With Economic Disadvantage in New York City.
Carol Duh-Leong, H Shonna Yin, Vanessa Salcedo and 5 others
PMID 36082453WHAT IT FOUND
Immigrant Chinese mothers filtered advice from family in China and local networks against their US reality.
They relied on infant feedback to guide feeding, often stopping practices if the baby cried. Cultural beliefs about 'hot' foods sometimes led to stopping breastfeeding.
Key findings
01Mothers actively filtered advice from transnational networks, rejecting 'outdated ideas' from family in China because they did not fit their US environment.
02Infant behavior, specifically crying and preference, directly determined whether mothers continued or stopped breastfeeding and solid food introduction.
03Cultural health beliefs influenced feeding decisions, with one mother stopping breastfeeding because she attributed infant gas to 'hot' foods she ate.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
Participants were recruited from a breastfeeding-friendly health center, which may have increased social desirability bias in reporting feeding practices. Interviews were conducted over the phone due to the pandemic, limiting the ability to observe non-verbal cues. The sample was limited to mothers with smartphone access and literacy, excluding the most marginalized families. Translation from Chinese to English may have introduced interpretation errors.
Declared interests
The authors have no financial relationships relevant to this article to disclose.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume that all mothers in this demographic stop breastfeeding due to lack of knowledge. Many actively filtered advice and made decisions based on infant distress or specific cultural interpretations of symptoms, such as gas related to maternal diet.