The Relationship Between Postpartum Sexual Well-Being and Parenting Sense of Competence Among Mixed-Gender, First-Time Parent Couples

Although sexual well-being often declines during the transition to parenthood, little is known about how couples' sexual experiences relate to parental adjustment. Sexual satisfaction and sexual distress are central indicators of sexual well-being and may be associated with parents' perceptions of competence through spillover within individuals and crossover between partners. Guided by Family Systems Theory, this study examined associations between sexual satisfaction, sexual distress, and parenting sense of competence among first-time parent couples during the postpartum period. Participants were 132 mixed-gender first-time parent couples from Portugal assessed at three months postpartum. Associations between sexual satisfaction, sexual distress, and parenting sense of competence were examined using dyadic Actor-Partner Interdependence Models (APIM). The results indicated that greater sexual satisfaction was associated with men's own greater sense of parental competence, greater own sexual distress was associated with lower parental competence for both partners, and men's greater sexual distress was associated with women's lower parental competence. After adjustment for contextual variables, only the actor associations for men's sexual satisfaction and sexual distress remained statistically significant. These findings highlight the associations of sexual satisfaction and sexual distress with couples' adjustment to parenthood, particularly among new fathers, and suggest that sexual experiences and perceptions of parenting competence may represent interconnected aspects of adjustment during the postpartum period.