Mothers’ work–family conflict and enrichment:associations with parenting quality and couple relationship

Background Employment participation of mothers of young children has steadily increased in developed nations. Combining work and family roles can create conflicts with family life, but can also bring enrichment.Work–family conflict and enrichment experienced by mothers may also impact children’s home environments via parenting behaviour and the couple relationship, particularly in the early years of parenting when the care demands for young children is high. Methods In order to examine these associations, while adjusting for a wide range of known covariates of parenting and relationship quality, regression models using survey data from 2151 working mothers of 4- to 5-year-old children are reported. Results/Conclusion Results provided partial support for the predicted independent relationships between work–family conflict, enrichment and indicators of the quality of parenting and the couple relationship

Enhancing the early home learning environment through a brief group parenting intervention: study protocol for a cluster randomised controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: The quality of the home learning environment has a significant influence on children's language and communication skills during the early years with children from disadvantaged families disproportionately affected. This paper describes the protocol and participant baseline characteristics of a community-based effectiveness study. It evaluates the effects of 'smalltalk', a brief group parenting intervention (with or without home coaching) on the quality of the early childhood home learning environment. METHODS/DESIGN: The study comprises two cluster randomised controlled superiority trials (one for infants and one for toddlers) designed and conducted in parallel. In 20 local government areas (LGAs) in Victoria, Australia, six locations (clusters) were randomised to one of three conditions: standard care (control); smalltalk group-only program; or smalltalk plus (group program plus home coaching). Programs were delivered to parents experiencing socioeconomic disadvantage through two existing age-based services, the maternal and child health service (infant program, ages 6-12 months), and facilitated playgroups (toddler program, ages 12-36 months). Outcomes were assessed by parent report and direct observation at baseline (0 weeks), post-intervention (12 weeks) and follow-up (32 weeks). Primary outcomes were parent verbal responsivity and home activities with child at 32 weeks. Secondary outcomes included parenting confidence, parent wellbeing and children's communication, socio-emotional and general development skills. Analyses will use intention-to-treat random effects ("multilevel") models to account for clustering. RECRUITMENT AND BASELINE DATA: Across the 20 LGAs, 986 parents of infants and 1200 parents of toddlers enrolled and completed baseline measures. Eighty four percent of families demonstrated one or more of the targeted risk factors for poor child development (low income; receives government benefits; single, socially isolated or young parent; culturally or linguistically diverse background). DISCUSSION: This study will provide unique data on the effectiveness of a brief group parenting intervention for enhancing the early home learning environment of young children from disadvantaged families. It will also provide evidence of the extent to which additional one-on-one support is required to achieve change and whether there are greater benefits when delivered in the 1st year of life or later. The program has been designed for scale-up across existing early childhood services if proven effective. TRIAL REGISTRATION: 8 September 2011; ACTRN12611000965909 .This research was commissioned and funded by the Victorian Government Department of Education and Early Childhood (now the Department of Education and Training, DET). JN, MT, SB, TH, VH, EW and NH were employees of the Parenting Research Centre when this study was designed and conducted. JN, SB, EW & NH are currently supported by the Australian Communities Foundation through the Roberta Holmes Transition to Contemporary Parenthood Program (Coronella sub-fund); EW was part-funded by the Centre for Research Excellence in Child Language at Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (NHMRC grant 1023493). OU is funded by the UK National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care (CLAHRC) for the South West Peninsula at the Royal Devon and Exeter NHS Foundation Trust. The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the funding bodies

The Child and Parent Emotion Study: Protocol for a longitudinal study of parent emotion socialisation and child socioemotional development

Introduction:&nbsp;Parents shape child emotional competence and mental health via their beliefs about children&rsquo;s emotions, emotion-related parenting, the emotional climate of the family and by modelling emotion regulation skills. However, much of the research evidence to date has been based on small samples with mothers of primary school-aged children. Further research is needed to elucidate the direction and timing of associations for mothers and fathers/partners across different stages of child development. The Child and Parent Emotion Study (CAPES) aims to examine longitudinal associations between parent emotion socialisation, child emotion regulation and socioemotional adjustment at four time points from pregnancy to age 12 years. CAPES will investigate the moderating role of parent gender, child temperament and gender, and family background.Methods and analysis:&nbsp;CAPES recruited 2063 current parents from six English-speaking countries of a child 0&ndash;9 years and 273 prospective parents (ie, women/their partners pregnant with their first child) in 2018&ndash;2019. Participants will complete a 20&ndash;30 min online survey at four time points 12 months apart, to be completed in December 2022. Measures include validated parent-report tools assessing parent emotion socialisation (ie, parent beliefs, the family emotional climate, supportive parenting and parent emotion regulation) and age-sensitive measures of child outcomes (ie, emotion regulation and socioemotional adjustment). Analyses will use mixed-effects regression to simultaneously assess associations over three time-point transitions (ie, T1 to T2; T2 to T3; T3 to T4), with exposure variables lagged to estimate how past factors predict outcomes 12 months later.Ethics and dissemination:&nbsp;Ethics approval was granted by the Deakin University Human Research Ethics Committee and the Deakin University Faculty of Health Human Research Ethics Committee. We will disseminate results through conferences and open access publications. We will invite parent end users to co-develop our dissemination strategy, and discuss the interpretation of key findings prior to publication.Trial registeration:&nbsp;Protocol pre-registration: DOI 10.17605/OSF.IO/NGWUY.</jats:sec

Unsupervised home spirometry is not equivalent to supervised clinic spirometry in children and young people with cystic fibrosis: results from the CLIMB-CF study

BACKGROUND: Handheld spirometry allows monitoring of lung function at home, of particular importance during the COVID-19 pandemic. Pediatric studies are unclear on whether values are interchangeable with traditional, clinic-based spirometry. We aimed to assess differences between contemporaneous, home (unsupervised) and clinic (supervised) spirometry and the variability of the former. The accuracy of the commercially available spirometer used in the study was also tested. METHODS: Data from participants in the Clinical Monitoring and Biomarkers to stratify severity and predict outcomes in children with cystic fibrosisc (CLIMB-CF) Study aged ≥ 6 years who had paired (±1 day) clinic and home forced expiratory volume in 1 s (FEV1 ) readings were analyzed. Variability during clinical stability over 6-months was assessed. Four devices from Vitalograph were tested using 1 and 3 L calibration syringes. RESULTS: Sixty-seven participants (median [interquartile range] age 10.7 [7.6-13.9] years) provided home and clinic FEV1 data pairs. The mean (SD) FEV1 % bias was 6.5% [±8.2%]) with wide limits of agreement (-9.6% to +22.7%); 76.2% of participants recorded lower results at home. Coefficient of variation of home FEV1 % during stable periods was 9.9%. Data from the testing of the handheld device used in CLIMB-CF showed a potential underread. CONCLUSION: In children and adolescents, home spirometry using hand-held equipment cannot be used interchangeably with clinic spirometry. Home spirometry is moderately variable during clinical stability. New handheld devices underread, particularly at lower volumes of potential clinical significance for smaller patients; this suggests that supervision does not account fully for the discrepancy. Opportunities should be taken to obtain dual device measurements in clinic, so that trend data from home can be utilized more accurately

Prematurity, executive functions and quality of parental care: a systematic review

Este artigo de revisão visa contextualizar o desenvolvimento das funções executivas (FE) em crianças prematuras, com especial atenção para o efeito dos cuidados parentais. As principais bases eletrônicas foram utilizadas para essa revisão: 31 estudos originais, duas meta-análises, uma meta-síntese e dois artigos de revisão foram identificados. Concluiu-se que as crianças prematuras têm maior risco de disfunção executiva global, sendo a qualidade dos cuidados parentais fundamentais para a modulação das FE, nomeadamente no que concerne às variáveis socioemocionais da interação, como a sensibilidadematerna. Salientam-se ainda as principais limitações dos estudos analisados e apontam-se recomendações para futura investigação sobre os efeitos dos cuidados parentais no desenvolvimento de FE em crianças prematuras.This review article aims to contextualize the development of executive functions (EF) in preterm children with special attention to the effects of parental care. The main electronic databases were used for this review: 31 original studies, two meta-analyses, one meta-synthesis and two systematic reviews were identified. The results showed that preterm infants are at risk for global executive dysfunction,and that the quality of parenting impacts the development of EF, mainly in terms of interactive socio-emotional variables, like maternal sensitivity.Finally, the main limitations of the analyzed studies are pointed out, and recommendations of future research about the effects of parental care in the development of EF in preterm children are offered.(undefined)info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Child, parent, and family mental health and functioning in Australia during COVID-19:comparison to pre-pandemic data

The COVID-19 pandemic presents significant risks to population mental health. Despite evidence of detrimental effects for adults, there has been limited examination of the impact of COVID-19 on parents and children specifically. We aim to examine patterns of parent and child (0–18 years) mental health, parent substance use, couple conflict, parenting practices, and family functioning during COVID-19, compared to pre-pandemic data, and to identify families most at risk of poor outcomes according to pre-existing demographic and individual factors, and COVID-19 stressors. Participants were Australian mothers (81%) and fathers aged 18 years and over who were parents of a child 0–18 years (N = 2365). Parents completed an online self-report survey during ‘stage three’ COVID-19 restrictions in April 2020. Data were compared to pre-pandemic data from four Australian population-based cohorts. Compared to pre-pandemic estimates, during the pandemic period parents reported higher rates of parent depression, anxiety, and stress (Cohen’s d = 0.26–0.81, all p < 0.001), higher parenting irritability (d = 0.17–0.46, all p < 0.001), lower family positive expressiveness (d = − 0.18, p < 0.001), and higher alcohol consumption (22% vs 12% drinking four or more days per week, p < 0.001). In multivariable analyses, we consistently found that younger parent age, increased financial deprivation, pre-existing parent and child physical and mental health conditions, COVID-19 psychological and environmental stressors, and housing dissatisfaction were associated with worse parent and child functioning and more strained family relationships. Our data suggest wide-ranging, detrimental family impacts associated with the COVID-19 pandemic; and support policy actions to assist families with financial supports, leave entitlements, and social housing

Reconnecting mothers and children after violence (RECOVER): a feasibility study protocol of child-parent psychotherapy in Australia

INTRODUCTION: Intimate partner violence detrimentally affects the social and emotional well-being of children and mothers. These two populations are impacted both individually and within the context of their relationship with one another. Child mental health, maternal mental health and the mother-child relationship may be impaired as a consequence. Early intervention to prevent or arrest impaired mother-child attachment and child development is needed. Dyadic or relational mental health interventions that include mothers with their children, such as child-parent psychotherapy, are effective in improving the mental health of both children and mothers and also strengthening their relationship. While child-parent psychotherapy has been trialled overseas in several populations, Australian research on relational interventions for children and women recovering from violence is limited. This study aims to assess the acceptability and feasibility of implementing child-parent psychotherapy in Australian families. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: Using a mixed methods, prepost design this feasibility study will examine the acceptability of the intervention to women with preschool aged children (3-5 years, n=15 dyads) and providers, and identify process issues including recruitment, retention and barriers to implementation and sustainability. In addition, intervention efficacy will be assessed using maternal and child health outcomes and functioning, and mother-child attachment measures. Young children's mental health needs are underserviced in Australia. More research is needed to fully understand parenting in the context of intimate partner violence and what works to help women and children recover. If the intervention is found to be feasible, findings will inform future trials and expansion of child-parent psychotherapy in Australia. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethics approval obtained from clinical sites and the La Trobe University Human Research Ethics Committee (ID: HEC17-108). Results will be disseminated through conference proceedings and academic publications