Specificity of the effects of parenting program components to reduce risk factors for child conduct problems

Parents concerned about their child's (3-8 yrs) behavior problems will be randomized to any combination, and various sequences, of three parenting program techniques, based on established parenting program content: (A) The Child’s Game (Forehand & McMahon, 1981), in which parents learn to be attentive to their child’s needs and respond to these in a sensitive matter; (B) Positive Notes (Leijten et al., 2016), in which parents learn to shift their attention from disruptive behavior to positive child behavior, and to positively reinforce this behavior; and (C) reflection exercises focusing on Mastery Experiences to increase feelings of parental self-efficacy (Bandura, 1997). This factorial experiment consists of 22 conditions. Effects of the three techniques will be tested on their targeted risk factor (A: parent-child relationship quality; B: coercive parent-child interaction cycles; C: parental self-efficacy; primary outcomes) and on children's conduct problems (secondary outcome) immediately after the two-week intervention period and at twelve weeks post baseline.

We will test whether each component specifically reduces the risk factor it aims to target: Does component A (relational perspective based child-led play) improve the parent-child relationship, and not coercive parent-child interaction cycles or self-efficacy; does component B (learning theory based positive reinforcement) improve coercive parent-child interaction cycles and not the parent-child relationship or self-efficacy; and does component C (self-efficacy theory based mastery experiences) improve parental self-efficacy and not the parent-child relationship or coercive parent-child interaction cycles. We do not have any a priori hypothesis as to whether effects will or will not be specific.

T0 (baseline); T2 (two weeks post baseline; immediately after the first component); T4 (four weeks post baseline; immediately after the second component); T6 (six weeks post baseline; immediately after the third component); T12 (twelve weeks post baseline; 6 weeks follow-up of last components)

Component A: The Child's Game (Forehand & McMahon, 1981); Component B: Positive Notes (Leijten et al., 2016; Van Aar et al., 2020); Component C: Mastery Experiences (Bandura, 1997). Each components consists of an animation clip explaining the technique and daily exercises for two weeks.