Randomized preventive intervention for families: Adolescents' emotional insecurity and attachment to fathers.

The family communication project was a randomized preventive intervention designed to support families by improving interparental conflict behavior and the parent-child relationship, with the ultimate goal of decreasing emotional insecurity in the interparental relationship. Evidence for programs that may benefit father-adolescent attachment and adolescents' emotional insecurity in the marital context is a gap in the literature. According to the fathering vulnerability hypothesis, father-child attachment security might be expected to especially benefit from improvements in interparental conflict behavior. The present study evaluated whether there were any indirect effects of this intervention on emotional insecurity via attachment with each parent, with a particular interest in the role of father-child attachment. Cross-lagged panel models revealed that the parent-adolescent (PA) treatment condition predicted significantly decreased emotional insecurity at 6 months through posttest attachment to fathers, relative to the control and parent-only conditions. Mother-adolescent attachment was improved in the PA condition at posttest but was not a significant mediator of subsequent adolescent emotional insecurity. Thus, the intervention's effects on father-adolescent attachment plays an important role in explaining the long-term effects of the intervention on emotional insecurity about the interparental relationship. Results also call attention to the value of including adolescents in interventions to improve interparental conflict and parent-child relationships. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Effects of a brief parenting intervention on Latinx mothers and their children.

Parent-Child Interactions (PCI) is a home visit parenting intervention designed to promote positive parenting and deter punitive approaches to child behavior management. With attention to the importance of providing efficacious interventions for families from diverse backgrounds, this study used a subsample from a larger randomized controlled trial (RCT) to examine the efficacy of PCI intervention among Latinx participants. PCI was offered to 170 at-risk Latinx mother-child dyads, of whom the majority were primarily Spanish speaking. Dyads were randomly assigned to an intervention or a wait-list control condition. Path analysis modeling was used to examine parenting outcomes as a mediator of program efficacy between group assignment and children's long-term functioning. Results suggest that Latinx parent and child functioning benefited from PCI intervention 6 months following intervention. Specifically, model results indicated significant indirect effects of the PCI intervention on (1) cooperative child behavior and (2) children's externalizing behaviors 6-months posttreatment via parenting at post test, with mother-child dyads assigned to the treatment condition, relative to the control, demonstrating better functioning 6-months posttreatment. Overall, findings contribute to increased understanding of parenting intervention implementation among Latinx families. Recommendations for future study are discussed.

Interacciones entre padres e hijos (Parent-Child Interactions, PCI) es una intervención en la crianza con visitas a los hogares diseñada para promover la crianza positiva y desalentar los métodos correctivos de manejo del comportamiento infantil. Con atención a la importancia de ofrecer intervenciones eficaces para las familias de distintos orígenes, en este estudio se utilize una submuestra de un ensayo controlado aleatorizado más grande para analizar la eficacia de una intervención de PCI entre participantes latinas. Se ofreció la PCI a 170 díadas de madres e hijas latinas en riesgo, de las cuales la mayoría eran principalmente hispanohablantes. Las díadas se asignaron aleatoriamente a un grupo de intervención o de control en lista de espera. Se utilizó el modelo de análisis de ruta para analizar los resultados de la crianza como mediadora de la eficacia del programa entre la distribución a los grupos y el funcionamiento a largo plazo de las niñas. Los resultados sugieren que el funcionamiento de las madres latinas y las niñas se benefició de la intervención de PCI seis meses después de la intervención. Específicamente, los resultados del modelo indicaron efectos indirectos significativos de la intervención de PCI en (1) el comportamiento cooperativo de las niñas y (2) las conductas de exteriorización de las niñas seis meses después del tratamiento mediante la crianza en la evaluación posterior, donde las díadas madre e hija asignadas al grupo de tratamiento, respecto del de control, demostraron un major funcionamiento seis meses después del tratamiento. En general, los resultados contribuyen a una mayor comprensión de la implementación de intervenciones en la crianza entre las familias latinas. Se comentan las recomendaciones para futuros estudios.