Clinical Research Directory

Evaluating Stress Management Strategies Within the School Readiness Parenting Program

The goal of this randomized study is to learn if adding three additional parent training sessions (focused on alleviating parental stress) to an already well-established treatment (School Readiness Parenting Program \[SRPP\]) in improving outcomes up to 6- and 12-months later for families of children with disruptive behavior disorders. The main questions it aims to answer are: The primary objective of this protocol is to evaluate the effects of three additional cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) based parent training sessions to the SRPP to reduce parent stress and improve parent-child interactions. The secondary objective of this protocol is to evaluate the behavioral, emotional, and physical health-based functioning among young children with ADHD. Researchers will compare families who receive the SRPP alone to families who receive the SRPP + the three additional CBT focused sessions. Parents will be sent surveys to complete prior to the baseline assessment via REDCap (online). Parent and child participants will undergo 2 hours of baseline assessments evaluating behavioral, cognitive, and academic functioning as well as parent-child interactions. Parents will provide contact information for their child's teacher and the teacher will sent three surveys to complete online via REDCap.

Promoting Co-Parenting and Reducing Hazardous Drinking in New Families

This study aims to understand if a parenting program that helps couples learn to parent as a team and maintain a healthy lifestyle, such as maintaining safer levels of alcohol use, promotes parent and child health and well-being. Programs will be delivered prenatally and postnatally and will include both group classes and individualized sessions. A comprehensive assessment is administered during pregnancy and then at 6 and 12 months of child age. It is hypothesized that targeting intervention during the naturally motivating transition to parenthood may not only provide opportunities for long lasting behavioral change for parents, but also initiate a cascade of protective processes that ultimately reduce risk for negative emotional and behavioral outcomes for children.

Preventing Vulnerable Child Syndrome in the NICU With Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (PreVNT Trial)

This study is being done to see if outcomes for both a premature infant's parents and the infant born prematurely who have spent time in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) can be improved through parent cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) sessions.

Sensory Optimization of the Hospital Environment

The long-term goal of this project is to improve the health and well-being of preterm infants and their parents. Although there is evidence to support positive multisensory interventions in the NICU, these interventions are often applied in an inconsistent manner, reducing their benefit. Through a rigorous and scientific process, we have developed a structured multisensory intervention program, titled Supporting and Enhancing NICU Sensory Experiences (SENSE), which includes specific doses and targeted timing of evidence-based interventions such as massage, auditory exposure, rocking, holding, and skin-to-skin care. The interventions are based on the infant's developmental stage and are adapted based on the infant's medical status and behavioral cues. The multisensory interventions are designed to be conducted during each day of NICU hospitalization by the parents, who are educated and supported to provide them. The proposed work aims to determine the effect of multisensory interventions on parent mental health, parent-child interaction, brain activity (amplitude integrated electroencephalography), and infant developmental outcomes through age 2 years, with specific attention to language outcome.

Parenting STAIR: Adapting a Trauma-Focused Parenting Intervention for Military-Connected Mothers and Their Children

The goal of this study is to assess Parenting STAIR Modular (PSTAIR-M), a promising and innovative intervention for military-connected mothers (MCM) who have experienced trauma and their young children (ages 2-10). PSTAIR-M aims to help mothers manage the strong feelings that sometimes happen after experiencing something scary or stressful, as well as to better connect with their children and manage their behavior effectively. The main questions the study aims to answer are: 1) Does PSTAIR-M reduce maternal PTSD and/or depression symptoms?, and 2) Does PSTAIR-M improve parental functioning? Researchers will compare PSTAIR-M to treatment as usual (TAU) - other EBTs offered at participating study sites - to determine if PSTAIR-M is more effective in improving mental health and parenting. Participants will: 1) attend 12-16 weekly, 1-hour online treatment sessions with their assigned clinicians, 2) complete three 1-hour online assessments administered by research staff, 3) engage with their child in three 15-30-minute online, observed play sessions, 4) have assessments and observed play sessions audio and video recorded. Participants may also be invited to participate in an optional, 30-minute online one-on-one qualitative interview, which would be audio and video recorded and would cover participants' experiences with the intervention, the clinic sites, and their providers.

Examining Whether Project Support Works

This study will involve a randomized, controlled trial with two parallel groups, Project Support and a treatment as usual control group. Families with a child on the waitlist for trauma-focused services will be invited to participate. Participation involves completing a baseline assessment of family functioning and trauma characteristics. Participants will then be randomized to either Project Support or the treatment as usual control group. All participants will be invited to complete the post-test assessment 4-6 weeks after the baseline assessment, prior to beginning trauma-focused services.

Postpartum Intervention for Mothers With Opioid Use Disorders (R33)

Having met the milestones of the R61, this R33 is a 2-site, 2-group, pre/post RCT of mothers with OUD (n=\~80/group). We will test whether the beneficial pre-post changes in OUD mothers randomized to vMP exceed those of mothers assigned to Enhanced Usual Care (EUC) and via changes in Maternal Brain Neurocircuits.

Responsible Engaged and Loving (REAL) Fathers Intervention Evaluation

The goal of this stepped-wedge cluster randomized control trial is to assess whether a Ugandan community-based intervention for young fathers (ages 18-25 years) of children ages 0-3 years impacts fathers' knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors surrounding positive parenting practices, father-child interaction, harsh physical punishment of children, and intimate partner violence.

Family-Focused Adolescent &Amp; Lifelong Health Promotion Optimization Trial

The aim of this study is to conduct a multi-country, cluster-randomized factorial trial to optimize the Parenting for Lifelong Health (PLH) for Parents and Teens program in Moldova and North Macedonia. Specifically, this trial will evaluate the effectiveness and cost consequences of three additional intervention components: UNICEF's Helping Adolescents Thrive comics, adolescent peer support based on UNICEF's I Support My Friends intervention, and engagement boosters. ALTERNATIVA will deliver the program in North Macedonia and Health for Youth Association in the Republic of Moldova. This trial is implemented according to the Multiphase Optimization Strategy (MOST). MOST involves three phases. The preparation phase involves adapting and piloting the intervention (Phase 1). The optimization phase involves a factorial trial (Phase 2). Finally, the evaluation phase involves conducting a randomized controlled trial to assess the optimized intervention's effectiveness and cost-effectiveness (Phase 3). A Phase 2 factorial trial is the focus of this registration.

The Playful Learning in Infancy Program

In the Playful Learning in Infancy Program, parents receive research-based educational guidance on playful interactions with their infants aged 0-1 year. They learn to recognize their infants' cues indicating readiness to engage in play and they are introduced to specific, developmentally appropriate activities for interactive engagement. The guidance is delivered to parents during routine home visits by public health visitors. The aims of the Playful Learning in Infancy Program are to 1) promote playful interactions between infants and parents, parental attitudes towards play, and infant socioemotional development; 2) enhance the language and knowledge of playful learning in infancy among frontline staff; and 3) evaluate the Playful Learning in Infancy Program for potential testing in a future large-scale RCT study. Evaluation is based on a parallel group study design, with half of the participants receiving care as usual and half of the participants receiving care as usual along with the Playful Learning in Infancy Program.

Conversations With Caregivers About Health and Appearance

This clinical trial is evaluating the effects of a 2-hour, small group discussion with parents and caregivers of adolescents in Oregon. The investigators will evaluate whether parents'/caregivers' experience reductions in their disordered eating symptoms, mood symptoms, and parent-child relationship quality, relative to parent/caregiver participants in the wait list control. The investigators will also evaluate whether the children of these parents/caregivers experience improvements in their disordered eating and mood symptoms.

HomeStyles-2: Shaping HOME Environments and LifeSTYLES to Prevent Childhood Obesity

Parents are children's primary role models, are food and physical activity gatekeepers, and create the structure/lifestyle environment within the home. Thus, parents strongly influence children's weight-related behaviors and have the opportunity to cultivate a "culture of health" within the home. Yet, there continues to be a dearth of evidence-based obesity prevention intervention programs, especially for families with children aged 6 to 11 years, commonly called the middle childhood years. The aim of the HomeStyles-2 online learning mode RCT is to determine whether this novel, age-appropriate, family intervention enables and motivates parents to shape their home environments and weight-related lifestyle practices (i.e., diet, exercise, sleep) to be more supportive of optimal health and reduced risk of obesity in their middle childhood youth more than those in the control condition. The RCT will include the experimental group and an attention control group who will engage in a bona fide concurrent treatment different in subject matter but equal in nonspecific treatment effects. The participants will be families with school-age children who are systematically randomly assigned by computer to study condition. The HomeStyles intervention is predicated on the social cognitive theory and a social ecological framework. The RCT will collect sociodemographic characteristics of the participant, child, and partner/spouse; child and parent health status; parent weight-related cognitions; weight-related behaviors of the parent and child; and weight-related characteristics of the home environment. Enrollment for this study will begin mid-2021.This paper describes these aspects of the HomeStyles-2 intervention: rationale; sample eligibility criteria and recruitment; study design; experimental group intervention theoretical and philosophical underpinnings, structure, content, and development process; attention control intervention; survey instrument development and components; outcome measures; and planned analyses.

Program Intensive Habilitation (PIH) for Young Children With Early Brain Damage

By longitudinal, prospective research in children with neurodisabilities including severe motor impairments and their parents to explore the beneficial effects of participating in an intensive habilitation program on the child's adaptive functioning and parental empowerment in order to treat and reduce the consequences of early brain damage.

INFANT HEALTH- Promoting Mental Health and Healthy Weight in Infancy Through Sensitive Parenting

Mental health problems and overweight often co-occur, they have their origin in early childhood and new research evidence suggest a key role of cognitive, emotional and behavioral regulation in the early developmental trajectories and points to the benefits of intervention in infancy that builds on strategies of sensitive parenting. The research group behind this project has developed the PUF program (PUF: In Danish: 'Psykisk Udvikling og Funktion') to target infants' mental health and development within the settings of community health nurses. Still, measures are lacking that address the infants most vulnerable regarding the development and progression of mental health problems and overweight. In this project, we develop and test a new intensified intervention to address major cognitive and regulatory vulnerabilities identified at child age 9-10 months and adapted to the settings of community health nurses. The intervention is created as an add-on to the PUF-program, using an evidence-based method to promote sensitive parenting, the Video-based Intervention to Promote Positive Parenting (VIPP). The new intervention VIPP-PUF comprises six therapeutic sessions delivered by the community health nurse during home visits over a three months period. The intervention builds on teaching the health nurses to promote parents' sensitivity to meet the infants' cognitive and regulatory vulnerabilities, and it takes in account the needs of psycho-socially disadvantaged families. The Infant Health project is conducted in sixteen municipalities across Denmark. We use the Intervention Mapping approach as the study frame and integrate the best practice of community health nurses. The efficacy of the VIPP-PUF intervention is examined in a randomized controlled step-wedge design, in which approximately 1.000 children are followed up to the age of 24 months. The VIPP-PUF intervention is hypothesized to reduce mental health problems at ages 24 months among infants with high levels of cognitive and regulatory problems at age 9-10 months, (primary outcome). Also, it is hypothesized that among children with high levels of cognitive and regulatory vulnerabilities at age 9-10 months, adding the VIPP-PUF intervention to treatment as usual at age 9-10 months, will reduce infants' cognitive and regulatory problems; promote healthy weight development; reduce parents' experiences of stress; promote sensitive parenting and promote parents' feeling of competence and relatedness.

Child-Adult Relationship Enhancement in Primary Care (PriCARE) / Criando Niños Con CARIÑO (CARIÑO)

The purpose of this study is evaluate the effectiveness of PriCARE/CARIÑO to reduce child maltreatment, improve parent-child interactions, and reduce harsh/neglectful parenting, parent stress, and child behaviors.

Dyad Plus Effectiveness/Feasibility

The purpose of this research is to determine the effectiveness of a coordinated program (Dyad Plus) that would help to facilitate self-monitoring, positive communication, joint problem solving, and social support to increase physical activity, healthy eating, and weight loss. Participants of the Brenner FIT (Families In Training) pediatric weight management program and their parent/guardian will co-enroll in weight loss programs. Parents/guardians will receive the components of By Design Essentials.

An Evidence-based Family Support Program for Parents and Children in Palestine: A Theory-based Intervention

Few evidence-based programs exist to support children and families affected by sociopolitical conflict, despite documented evidence of their heightened risk for emotional and behavioral adjustment problems associated with exposure to conflict and violence at multiple levels of the social ecology (e.g., political, community, and family). Thus, a critical need exists for an evidence-based program to ameliorate the impact of political violence on the overall well-being of children and families. The current study will conduct a rigorous evaluation of a theoretically-driven, family-based intervention program in Palestine, including both the West Bank and Gaza. Firmly grounded in the cultural context of Palestine but with broad implications for individuals exposed to sociopolitical violence, the long-term goal of this project is to provide a family-focused intervention program (Promoting Positive Family Futures; PPFF) that may facilitate individuals' sense of safety and support in the context of chronic adversity. The objective is to evaluate this intervention program in the context of a randomized clinical trial (RCT) in the West Bank and Gaza (N=300). The central hypothesis is that the program will have direct positive effects on family conflict, parent psychopathology and parental security in the family as well as on adolescent emotional security in the family, with cascading effects on adolescent adjustment. Consistent with family systems theory, we further hypothesize that treatment effects on parents will mediate on the effects of the treatment on adolescent adjustment. The rationale is that bolstering resilience in family systems is a key approach to promoting positive functioning in families exposed to chronic violence. The hypothesis will be evaluated with three specific aims: 1) evaluate the efficacy of an evidence-based family support program; 2) examine process models of treatment change, and 3) examine interrelations between parent and child functioning. To achieve these aims, the study will be an RCT employing a longitudinal design (N=300) with multi-method assessments at baseline (T1), post-test (T2), 6-month follow-up (T3) and 12-month follow-up (T4). Families included in the study will be evenly divided between the West Bank (n=150) and Gaza Strip (n=150). Families will be randomized into the intervention condition (PPFF) or treatment as usual (TAU). Each territory will have an implementing partner, and implementing partners and investigators will work together to ensure the study procedures are implemented in parallel across sites. Data collection will be conducted by trained research staff from a third-party survey and policy research organization. The proposal seeks to shift current research and clinical paradigms in these contexts by employing novel theoretical concepts, approaches, and methodologies. The contribution will be significant by 1) further developing new directions for empirically-based interventions in these high-risk contexts, and 2) advancing a relatively brief, cost-effective program that can be readily implemented to help children and families exposed to continuing conflict in Palestine, with the potential to be brought to scale in other contexts.

The Effect and Experience of the Parental Program AFFEKT

This project is the first to evaluate the effect and experience of the parent program AFFEKT, through a randomized controlled trial and qualitative study, within primary health care. The project will recruit 200 parents of children with externalizing behaviors, and evaluate the effect of AFFEKT and psychoeducation versus psychoeducation alone, on children's behaviors and mental health, and the parent's strategies and mental health. Through interviews the experience of AFFEKT will be investigated.

Delivering Evidence-Based Parenting Services to Families in Child Welfare Using Telehealth

The goal of this randomized controlled trial is to compare Promoting First Relationships - Home Visit (PFR-HV) to Promoting First Relationships - Telehealth (PFR-T) among parents of 6-12 month olds in the child welfare system. The main questions it aims to answer are: * Is PFR-T effective relative to PFR-HV and Usual Care with respect to observed parent sensitive and responsive care, parent knowledge of child social and emotional development, and child externalizing behavior? * Is PFR-T effective relative to PFR-HV and Usual Care with respect to child out-of-home placement in foster care relative to the control group? * How does PFR-T compare in a benefit-cost analysis to the cost-effectiveness relative to PFR-HV and Usual Care? * Are eligible families impacted by the lack of technology and Wi-Fi/cellular data to engage in PFR-T? * How does provider adherence and fidelity in delivery of PFR-T compare to adherence and fidelity of PFR-HV? What will participants be asked to do? 1. Participants will be asked to agree to randomization, resulting in their placement in one of three groups: PFR-HV, PFR-T, or the control group. 2. Participants will be asked to participate in three virtual research visits, over the course of approximately 12 months (families could be finished as early as 9 months, however in our experience, intervention sessions and research visits often need to be rescheduled, delaying completion of the study). The research visits take approximately 80 minutes, and families will be paid $75 for each visit they participate in. 3. During the research visit, the families will be asked to participate in videotaped research activities involving parent-child play and interaction. Parents will be asked to answer questions regarding their background, feelings, parenting opinions, and stress. 4. Families randomized to the PFR-HV intervention are asked to participate in a 10 week in home parenting program which includes videotaped caregiver-child interactions and feedback. 5. Families randomized to the PFR-T intervention are asked to participate in a 10-week parenting program that will occur over Zoom, which will include videotaped caregiver-child interactions and feedback. 6. Families randomized to the control group will be emailed a resource packet with some information about services or programs that might be helpful for them.

Talk Parenting Education Program II

The goal of this clinical trial is to learn whether Talk Parenting, a voice-based program delivered through an Amazon Echo Dot (Alexa), can help parents and caregivers of children ages 3-5 years improve challenging bedtime and morning routines. The main questions it aims to answer are: Does using Talk Parenting improve families' bedtime and morning experiences and children's sleep/wake habits? Does using Talk Parenting improve parents' routine-related parenting practices and confidence, strengthen the parent-child relationship, and reduce children's behavior problems and parents' stress? Researchers will compare families who receive Talk Parenting right away to families who wait 6 weeks to receive the program (a waitlist control group receiving usual services during the wait). Participants will: Complete online questionnaires at the start of the study and again about 6 weeks later (and a follow-up questionnaire later in the study). Receive a pre-configured Amazon Echo Dot (to keep) and instructions to use Talk Parenting routines at home, including a bedtime routine, a brief calming routine, and a morning routine (enabled after the first 2 weeks).

Assessment of the Mental State of Parents of Premature Children and Impact on Neurodevelopment of the Child

The objective of the study is to assess the psychic profile of parents of children born prematurely

Relationship Enhancement Digital Game

The purpose of this study is to test a new digital game. Specifically, this study will aim to evaluate a digital game prototype designed to facilitate playful interactions between parents and children. The prototype will incorporate activities grounded in relationship enhancement principles. Additionally, this study will check how well using digital tools helps build strong connections, makes people get along better, and boosts parents' confidence and parenting skills.

Potential Benefits of Parent Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT)

The goal of this study is to explore possible benefits of Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT). The main goals of the study are: * To investigate whether pre-survey measures of autonomic reactivity relate to the overall functioning of participants. * To examine the effects of PCIT To identify individual characteristics that influence the effects of PCIT. Participants will: * complete 5 online surveys (1x pre-PCIT, 3x during PCIT, and 1x post-PCIT) * complete the PCIT program

I-InTERACT Preterm Parenting

Many children born very preterm experience behavior problems, and existing resources for parenting these children are lacking. A pilot trial established the effectiveness of a preterm parenting intervention, I-Interact Preterm (I2P). This study proposes a three-arm randomized controlled trial (RCT) comparing the established seven-session I2P program, a microlearning delivery mode (I2P-Micro), and an internet resource comparison group (IRC). Outcomes will be assessed at pretreatment, post-treatment (12 weeks later), and at an extended follow-up six months post-randomization. These outcomes include parenting behaviors, child behavior problems, and parent distress. It is anticipated that both I2P and I2P-Micro will result in significant improvements relative to the IRC condition, with greater utilization expected in the I2P-Micro group.