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Waiting room parental training films improve child cognition
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A nonintrusive parental intervention training system was beneficial to the cognitive development of children and increased parenting skills, according to a recent study.
“A parenting intervention implemented during routine primary health care visits in three Caribbean countries improved child cognitive development and mothers’ knowledge of child development,” Susan M. Chang, PhD, of the University of the West Indies, Jamaica, and colleagues wrote. “The size of the cognitive benefit was comparable to other more intensive programs.”
The researchers assembled a cohort of 501 mother-child pairs from 29 primary health centers in St. Lucia, Jamaica and Antigua divided into control (n = 250) and intervention groups (n = 251).
The intervention group was exposed to short films of child development messages, message cards, and play materials during their waiting room time at routine visits when the children (mean age at final assessment, 19.7 months) were aged 3, 6, 9, 12 and 18 months. The 3-minute films contained messages on love, responding and comforting, talking with children, praise of children, using bath time to learn, looking at books, drawings, puzzles and games.
Results among the intervention cohort showed significant benefits in treatment effect for child cognitive development (3.09 points; 95% CI, 1.31-4.87). However, the interventions did not show any significant developmental benefit to children’s language or fine motor skills.
The researchers also said parental knowledge improved for mothers in the intervention group, indicating that they remembered the messages they viewed (treatment effect = 1.59; 95% CI, 1.01-2.17). This may have been enhanced by using actors in the videos that matched the cultural backgrounds of the intervention group mothers, they said.
“It is feasible to integrate a parenting intervention in child health clinics without the need for additional staff or asking mothers to spend extra time at the clinic,” Chang and colleagues wrote. “Despite low intensity and challenging clinic conditions, the intervention benefited child cognitive development and parent knowledge.” – by David Costill
Disclosure: The researchers report no relevant financial disclosures.
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