Loving Habits: A Feasibility Study of a Support Program for Building New Parent-child Behavioral Habits

Loving Habits: A Feasibility Study of a Support Program for Building New Parent-child Behavioral Habits

This study evaluates the feasibility and preliminary impacts of a new parent support program consisting of a series of educational videos, automatically delivered via a popular texting platform. The program content is focused on teaching parents strategies to better manage interactions with children in challenging situations many children experience, e.g., a transition to a non-preferred activity, waiting for delayed reward. Parents with children demonstrating inattentive, hyperactive and impulsive behavior and experiencing difficulties with these daily challenges are invited to participate in the study.

This study employs a pre-post, open trial design with the primary aim to investigate the feasibility of delivering parenting educational materials in an accessible format, i.e., a widely used messaging platform. The training videos demonstrate the applications of antecedent- and reinforcement-based behavior management techniques in a specific situation and encourage parents to build positive parenting habits. The program usability and satisfaction will be assessed through participant ratings. The study targets parents of children demonstrating inattention, hyperactive, and impulsive behavior. These families frequently experience difficulties managing everyday routines at home, yet the access to psychosocial treatment is limited. The investigators expect parents to engage well in the program delivered via digital media. Based on the existing literature on the effectiveness of behavior parent training delivered in traditional in-person format, a moderate effect size is expected in the pre-post measures of parenting practices and the child target behavior for this study.

Inclusion Criteria:

- Parents with children aged 4-10 who experience difficulties in situations targeted by the program.

*Note: The program will be advertised that it was developed targeting children demonstrating behaviors consistent with ADHD, and the ADHD symptoms will be measured pre-post. However, children are not required to have a diagnosis of ADHD or show elevated levels of ADHD symptoms for the mothers to sign up.

Exclusion Criteria:

- Parents who do not understand Japanese (the language the program is offered in).