Investigating the Impact of A Veteran-Focused Parenting Program on Parenting Stress, Competence and Parenting Practices

Parenting Clinical Trial

Official title:

Investigating the Impact of A Veteran-Focused Parenting Program on Parenting Stress, Competence and Parenting Practices

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT03722043
• Other study ID #: TU1726
• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: January 8, 2017
• Est. completion date: October 25, 2018

Study information

• Verified date: October 2018
• Source: University of Tulsa
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Interventional

Clinical Trial Summary

Veterans or spouses of veterans with a minor child will participate in a five-week parenting program. The goals of the parenting program are to assist in improving parent's sense of competence, improving parent's emotional regulation abilities, and lower parental stress by incorporating mindfulness and values-based parenting principles. The program will utilize evidence-based practices that will be delivered in a manner that incorporates aspects of military culture (i.e., language and concepts are tailored to that used within military culture). Mindfulness and acceptance and commitment therapy have been shown to be effective in treating service members [1], and this will be the first study that examines how learning these principles do or do not impact parenting stress, competence, and practices. The parenting program is free, and is offered by the investigators as a community service. Participation in the parenting program does not obligate enrollment in the research study.

Description:

There are over 312,000 Veterans living in the state of Oklahoma [2]. The Coffee Bunker is a non-profit community agency in Tulsa, Oklahoma that serves as the flagships program for Serving Our Service Members (S.O.S). The Coffee Bunker's mission is to offer support to service members and Veterans by helping them reintegrate back into their families and communities. The overall purpose of the present study is to work with the Coffee Bunker in offering support towards their mission, specifically in delivering organized parenting programs to service members and Veterans.

Challenges of reintegration after a military deployment can increase levels of stress for Veterans, spouses, and their children. In fact, it is common for Veterans or service members who struggle with reintegration in their family to report feelings of isolation and lack of perceived control, which may impact their ability to parent effectively. The struggles of parents can negatively impact the functioning of the family, such that children may exhibit more behavioral problems and Veterans parents may be more vulnerable to mental health symptomology [3, 4]. Fortunately, research suggests that positive and effective parenting practices can mitigate family stressors [5, 6]. As such, given the stressors of reintegration among military families, it may be advantageous to implement an evidence-based psychoeducation parenting program tailored to Veterans. The goals of the parenting program are to assist in improving parent's sense of competence, improving parent's emotional regulation abilities, and lower parental stress. The current project will be evaluating possible benefits from an evidence-based parenting program with military families. The parenting program is free, and is offered by the investigators as a community service. Participation in the parenting program does not obligate enrollment in the study. This is made possible by one of the PI's (Zanotti's) Schweitzer Fellowship; Zanotti is conducting the parenting program along with Dr. Cromer, as a community service.

The research portion of this study will be voluntary, and while participants will be recruited from the parenting program, it will be made clear that they can opt into the parenting program without doing any of the research measures. The research portion evaluates whether participation in the parenting program reduces parenting stress, increases feelings of parenting competence, and improves parenting practices. This study is unique in that evidence-based practices will be delivered in a manner that incorporates aspects of military culture (i.e., language and concepts are tailored to that used within military culture). The parenting program will incorporate mindfulness and values-based parenting principles. Mindfulness and acceptance and commitment therapy have been shown to be effective in treating service members [1] and this will be the first study that examines how learning these principles do or do not impact parenting stress, competence, and practices.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 13
• Est. completion date: October 25, 2018
• Est. primary completion date: October 25, 2018
• Accepts healthy volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers
• Gender: All
• Age group: 18 Years and older

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• Must be a parent of a minor

• Must be fluent in English

• Must be a veteran or have a spouse who is a veteran

Exclusion Criteria:

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Military Family
• Parenting

Intervention

Behavioral:
• Parenting Program
Parents will participate in a 5-week parenting program designed to uniquely work with veteran families. The program will target the following areas: mindful parenting strategies, emotional regulation, positive discipline, positive parenting/attachment, and sleep.

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
United States	Coffee Bunker	Tulsa	Oklahoma

Sponsors (1)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
University of Tulsa

Country where clinical trial is conducted

United States, 

References & Publications (11)

Berry, J. O., & Jones, W. H. (1995). The parental stress scale: Initial psychometric evidence. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 12, 463-472.

Elgar, F. J., Waschbusch, D. A., Dadds, M. R., & Sigvaldason, N. (2007). Development and validation of a short form of the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 16(2), 243-259.

Gratz, K. L., & Roemer, L. (2004). Multidimensional assessment of emotion regulation and dysregulation: Development, factor structure, and initial validation of the difficulties in emotion regulation scale. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assess

Johnston, C., & Mash, E. J. (1989). A measure of parenting satisfaction and efficacy. Journal of Clinical Child Psychology, 18(2), 167-175.

Lester P, Peterson K, Reeves J, Knauss L, Glover D, Mogil C, Duan N, Saltzman W, Pynoos R, Wilt K, Beardslee W. The long war and parental combat deployment: effects on military children and at-home spouses. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2010 Apr;49(4):310-20. Erratum in: J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2012 Mar;51(3):337. — View Citation

Lester, P., & Bursch, B. (2011). The long war comes home: Mitigating risk and promoting resilience in military children and families. Psychiatric Time, 28(7), 26-29.

Louie, A. D., & Cromer, L. D. (2014). Parent-child attachment during the deployment cycle: Impact on reintegration parenting stress. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 45(6), 496.

United States Census Bureau. (2015). Veteran Statistics-Oklahoma. Retrieved from https://www2.census.gov/library/infographics/2015/comm/vets/ok-vets.pdf.

Veltman, M. W., & Browne, K. D. (2001). Three decades of child maltreatment research implications for the school years. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, 2(3), 215-239.

Vujanovic, A. A., Niles, B., Pietrefesa, A., Schmertz, S. K., & Potter, C. M. (2013). Mindfulness in the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder among military veterans. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 42, 24-31.

Webster-Stratton C, Reid MJ, Hammond M. Preventing conduct problems, promoting social competence: a parent and teacher training partnership in head start. J Clin Child Psychol. 2001 Sep;30(3):283-302. — View Citation

* Note: There are 11 references in all — Click here to view all references

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	Change in Parenting Sense of Competence after 6 weeks, using the Parenting Sense of Competence Scale (PSOC; Johnston & Marsh, 1989)	The PSOC consists of 16 items about parents' confidence on being a parent, answered on a six-point scale ranging from ''strongly disagree'' to ''strongly agree''. Scoring for some items is reversed so that, for all items, higher scores indicate greater parenting self-esteem. Two subscales measure efficacy (seven items) and satisfaction (nine items) in parenting.	Pre-treatment, post-treatment (i.e., approximately 6 weeks after the start of the parenting program).
Secondary	Change in Parenting Stress after 6 weeks, using the Parenting Stress Scale (PSS; Berry & Jones, 1995)	This 18-item self-report measure assesses common stressors and positive components associated with parenting. Items are rated on a five-point Likert scale (i.e., 1=strongly disagree, 5=strongly agree). Positive items are reverse scored. A total stress score is generated by summing the items together (i.e., range=18-90). Higher scores indicate greater parental stress.	Pre-treatment, post-treatment (i.e., approximately 6 weeks after the start of the parenting program)
Secondary	Change in Parent's Emotion Regulation Abilities after 6 weeks, using the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scales (DERS; Gratz & Roemer, 2004)	This 36-item questionnaire assesses aspects of emotion regulation and dysregulation strategies utilized by individuals. Items are rated on a five-point Likert scale (i.e., 1=almost never, 5=almost always). Negatively worded items are reverse scored. Six component scores as well as a total scare is generated. Higher scores indicate greater emotion dysregulation.	Pre-treatment, post-treatment (i.e., approximately 6 weeks after the start of the parenting program)
Secondary	Change in Parenting Practices after 6 weeks, using the Parenting Practices Interview (PPI; Webster-Stratton, Reid, & Hammond, 2001)	The PPI was adapted from the Oregon Social Learning Centre's Discipline Questionnaire. Two subscales were used; Harsh Discipline (14 items, a 1/4 0.79), and Positive Parenting (15 items, a 1/4 0.67). Parents reported the probability and the frequency with which they used the different strategies on a seven-point scale.	Pre-treatment, post-treatment (i.e., approximately 6 weeks after the start of the parenting program)
Secondary	Change in Parenting Styles after 6 weeks, using the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire-Short Form (APQ-9; Elgar, Waschbusch, Dadds, & Sigvaldason, 2007)	This 9-item self-report measure assesses three styles of parenting: positive parenting, inconsistent discipline, and poor supervision. It has good convergent validity with longer measures of parenting styles. Responses are provided on a Likert scale where 1 = never, 2 = almost never, 3 = sometimes, 4= often, and 5 = always.	Pre-treatment, post-treatment (i.e., approximately 6 weeks after the start of the parenting program)