Computerized Parenting Intervention

This study will evaluate a low cost, low intensity, technology based model for delivering parenting skills to parents of adolescents in a community mental health clinic (CMHC). Specifically, we will test a computer-assisted protocol of Parenting Wisely, a computer based parenting program with previously established efficacy. Such an intervention is consistent with NIMH strategic plan objective 3.3: "to strengthen the application of mental health interventions in diverse care settings by examining community and intervention delivery approaches and how they may affect intervention outcomes." Although this is a pilot effectiveness study, we will gather information to inform future implementation efforts including the feasibility and acceptability of the intervention. Additionally, we will conduct qualitative interviews with relevant stakeholders (providers/program managers) to better understand barriers and facilitators of adoption and sustainability. This goal will help increase the likelihood of a successful, future larger trial across multiple CMHCs due to its focus on external validity and implementation barriers when making critical design decisions. This approach mitigates a major criticism of traditional efficacy/effectiveness studies, i.e. that the methods do not translate well to the community due to cost and resource constraints, as well as contextual factors.

The intervention has the potential to improve public health and community practice by making empirically supported treatment techniques more available in CMHCs and improving the efficiency of treatment delivery by integrating computerized and therapist delivered approaches. Specifically, this study has the potential to advance treatment by: 1) understanding factors that enhance or impede computer assisted parent training in the community setting; 2) addressing a high-needs underserved population with significant public health relevance; 3) engaging the target mechanism of therapist fidelity, competency, and alliance as well as parenting skills and self-efficacy that have been shown to influence adolescent behavior problems; 4) increasing access to and engagement in an evidence-based treatment that can be personalized to the specific parenting skills of a family by the selection of modules in PW; and 5) enhancing the ease of dissemination and implementation. Furthermore, we believe this approach has the potential for improving response rate, because the parenting skills will be delivered with greater fidelity than would be typical of therapists teaching parenting in sessions in CHMCs. This improvement should also result in an improved response in adolescent behavior. We believe this is true because: 1) meta-analyses typically report moderate effect sizes for parent training at the end of treatment; 2) parent training is underemployed in community clinics; 3) fidelity to treatment protocols is often poor which has been shown to diminish effectiveness of treatment; and 4) frequent staff turnover creates high resource demands. Thus, we believe this approach is not only efficient but that there is potential for significant improvements in efficacy of parent training with this model.