Infanet

Funded by the National Institute of Mental Health

First-time parents living in poverty are at significantly elevated risk of a host of detrimental family outcomes, including the development of child behavior problems, neglect and abuse of children, child learning problems and parental substance abuse.  Research on first time parents found that early interventions to improve parenting practices were effective to ameliorate these outcomes.  Yet, there exist major obstacles to the effective delivery of mental health services, particularly in rural areas. The need of rural families for mental health services is reaching crisis proportions due to the dearth of trained professionals.  In addition, the meteoric rise of Internet use has created a new avenue for people to communicate and share ideas. These two trends are helping fuel the demand for mental health services and on-line support. Computer mediated interventions and assessment are feasible because of the wide penetration of Internet access.

Internet programs can be interactive, personalize information based on participant characteristics and interests, provide a high degree of choice and flexibility, and provide social support from peers and professionals.  Through the use of recent advances in multimedia technology and software as well as the rise of computer networking via the Internet, there now exists an opportunity to provide such monitoring of outcomes and remote contact for rural locations.

This R34 proposal aims to adapt and pilot test an existing empirically proven parenting program, for delivery via the Internet, enhanced with home visits.  This exploratory research project will provide parents of infants 3.5 to 7 months (at enrollment) with a computer, “eyeball” computer camera, Internet connection, and technical training/support for 6 months to evaluate the digital translation.

The current project will use a computer-guided parent-infant interaction task, automatically recorded with a digital camera and transferred over the Internet for coding. This system would enable Parent Coaches to make treatment decisions with objective data, as well as provide outcomes assessment from remote research sites.

Using an experimental design will evaluate the impact of the interactive Internet training intervention as compared to usual-care (control). After recruiting from Early Head Start program in rural Oregon and Kansas, 40 families will be randomizedto either the intervention or control conditions. All families will be provided with a computer and Internet connection to provide for computerized data collection and control for the effects of the introduction of new technology in families with low-incomes. Parent coaches will make weekly, phone calls and email to assisst parents with the use of the computer and questions/concerns about the program. Parenting practices (coded from direct observations) will serve as the primary outcome. Subject characteristics and process measures will be examined as predictors or mediaators. The proposed design will provide important practical information about the feasibility and effectiveness of an Internet parenting intervention on parenting behavior.

This project is collaborative effort among researchers at the Oregon Research Institute, Juniper Gardens Children’s Project at the University of Kansas, and the Health Science Center at the University of Texas.

Researchers leading this project include:

Edward Feil, Ph.D.	Oregon Research Institute
Kathleen Baggett, Ph.D.	Juniper Gardens Children’s Project, University of Kansas
Judith Carta, Ph.D.	Juniper Gardens Children’s Project, University of Kansas
Betsy Davis, Ph.D.	Oregon Research Institute
Susan Landry, Ph.D.	Health Science Center, University of Texas
Lisa Sheber, Ph.D.	Oregon Research Institute

 

For more information in Kansas, contact: Kathleen Baggett, Ph.D. (kbaggett@ku.edu) or Judith Carta, Ph.D. (carta@ku.edu)