Exploring “psychic transparency” during pregnancy: a mixed-methods approach

BACKGROUND: Psychic transparency is described as a psychic crisis occurring during pregnancy. The objective was to test if it was clinically detectable. METHODS: Seven primiparous and seven nulliparous subjects were recorded during 5 min of spontaneous speech about their dreams. 25 raters from five groups (psychoanalysts, psychiatrists, general practitioners, pregnant women and medical students) listened to the audiotapes. They were asked to rate the probability of the women being pregnant or not. Their ability to discriminate the primiparous women was tested. The probability of being identified correctly or not was calculated for each woman. A qualitative analysis of the speech samples was performed. RESULTS: No group of rater was able to correctly classify pregnant and non-pregnant women. However, the raters’ choices were not completely random. The wish to be pregnant or to have a baby could be linked to a primiparous classification whereas job priorities could be linked to a nulliparous classification. CONCLUSIONS: It was not possible to detect Psychic transparency in this study. The wish for a child might be easier to identify. In addition, the raters’ choices seemed to be connected to social representations of motherhood.