Evaluation of a brief parenting discussion group for parents of young children.
OBJECTIVE
Although behavioral parenting programs are effective at treating child behavioral problems, a significant number of parents experiencing these problems do not receive help, and briefer, more cost-effective parenting interventions are lacking. This study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of a brief parenting discussion group.


METHODS
Sixty-seven parents were randomly assigned to either an intervention or waitlist control condition. Parents in the intervention condition took part in a 2-hour discussion group in which they were taught positive parenting strategies to prevent and manage their child's disobedience, and they received 2 follow-up telephone calls after the discussion group.


RESULTS
Results showed that after intervention, there were reductions in child behavior problems and use of dysfunctional parenting and improvements in parental self-efficacy and the parenting experience for parents. These effects were maintained at 6-month follow-up.


CONCLUSIONS
The results are promising because they show that a brief intervention can be minimally sufficient to improve child and parent outcomes for parents experiencing high levels of child behavior problems.
Morawska
Alina
A
Parenting and Family Support Centre, School of Psychology, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland 4072, Australia. alina@psy.uq.edu.au
Haslam
Divna
D
Milne
Danielle
D
Sanders
Matthew R
MR
D002653:Child Behavior Disorders / Q000517:prevention & control*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006266:Health Education / Q000379:methods*; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D057194:Intention to Treat Analysis; D008297:Male; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D016487:Parenting; D010290:Parents; D011793:Queensland; D020377:Self Efficacy; D012944:Social Support