Clinical Research Directory

Childhood Obesity Management Using Innovative Digital Technology

The project will evaluate the short- and long-term effects of a 10-week Family Healthy Living Program (FHLP). The program is designed for families with children ages 8-12 years old who are at risk for being above a healthy weight and who would like support with healthy living habits such as physical activity and healthy eating. Families will participate together, with both parents and children being involved in the program. FHLP participants will receive 9 weekly 2-hour online group sessions with a facilitation team as well as additional web-based resources. They will be compared to a control group of participating families who will be offered only the self-guided web-based resources. This will help us see the impact of offering facilitated FHLP group sessions versus only offering resources online. The FHLP is 10 weeks long, but participants will be followed for 12 months in total so that researchers can look at the long-term impact of participation. All participating families from both groups will be asked to complete surveys and provide child height and weight measurements at four timepoints: before beginning the program, immediately after completing the program, at 6-months post-program, and at 12-months post-program. Children will also be given FitBit activity watches to measure their daily step counts at each timepoint. Researchers will compare survey responses, child growth patterns, and FitBit step counts between the FHLP participants and the control group to see whether participating in the FHLP helps families improve their healthy living habits more than only offering a similar curriculum of healthy living resources online for families to access on their own.

Problem Management Plus Mindfulness-informed Legal Education for Addressing Gender-based Violence and Improving Parenting

Gender-based violence and, more specifically, domestic violence is a prevalent problem globally and in Nigeria. Its effect significantly impacts women and also the wellbeing of their families. Limited access to support has posed a constraint in effectively addressing the issues suffered by affected victims in Nigeria. In addition, gender-based violence could affect parenting due to factors such as anxiety, trauma, depression, poor social support, limited awareness of legal channels for complaint and harsh parenting to children. The implication is that it could not only have a negative impact on the affected victim but also on their parenting styles or caring responsibilities, which could be detrimental to the child development, wellbeing and the potential subsequent resort to criminal behaviours. In essence, the current study aims to test the feasibility and acceptability of a novel cross disciplinary intervention titled, Problem Management plus Mindfulness-informed Legal Education (PM+MiLE) for addressing gender-based violence and improving parenting in Nigeria in comparison to the waitlist control group for the purposes of improving social cohesion, legal awareness, wellbeing and reducing depression, including trauma and anxiety as a result of experiencing gender-based violence, in Nigeria.