Key Elements and Theoretical Logic of Perinatal Women's Depressive Psychological Help-seeking Behavior: An Analysis Based on Grounded Theory

Abstract Perinatal female depression is an important public health problem affecting the physical and mental health of mothers and babies, but in the existing mental health service system, their psychological help-seeking behavior still faces difficulties such as low utilization, ambiguous path and process obstruction, which restricts the early identification and intervention effectiveness of depression problems. As a key link in the depressive intervention chain, the formation mechanism and internal logic of perinatal womens psychological help-seeking behavior lack systematic explanation. Based on the grounded theory method, this study selected perinatal women in central China as the research objects, collected their depression experience and psychological help-seeking experience through semi-structured in-depth interviews, and analyzed them using open-ended, spindle-based and selective coding. The study found that the depression and psychological help-seeking behavior of perinatal women was initiated by depression cognition and problem awareness, and under the condition of emotional and relational support and mental health stigma experience, the available resources were weighed, and the follow-up help-seeking decision was continuously adjusted in the feedback of the interactive experience of help-helping. The above elements interact in specific situations to form a dynamic evolution and cyclic feedback psychological help-seeking behavior generation process. Based on this, this paper constructs a theoretical model of psychological help-seeking behavior of perinatal women, reveals the internal logical path of "perception-trade-off-action-feedback", and provides a theoretical reference for optimizing perinatal mental health services and improving the accuracy of intervention.