Improving Adolescent Parenting: Results From a Randomized Controlled Trial of a Home Visiting Program for Young Families

Abstract

A paraprofessional home visiting program specifically targeting young mothers appears effective in domains of particular salience to young parents and their infants and toddlers. Expanding participation in the program appears a worthy goal for program administrators and policymakers.

A Systematic Review of Programs to Promote Aspects of Teen Parents’ Self-sufficiency: Supporting Educational Outcomes and Healthy Birth Spacing

“…Throughout, we draw attention to implications for policy and program development and the need for future research. (Barnet et al 2009) a Repeat pregnancy within 24 months of prior birth (24 months after enrollment) Immediate NR* CenteringPregnancy Plus HIV Prevention: Atlanta/New Haven trial (Kershaw et al 2009) Repeat pregnancy within 12 months of prior birth (15 months after enrollment) Longer• term NR CenteringPregnancy Plus HIV Prevention: New York City trial (Ickovics et al 2016) Repeat pregnancy within 12 months of prior birth (15 months (Kitzman et al 1997Olds et al 2004, 2010 Repeat pregnancy within 6 months of prior birth (5 years after enrollment) Longer (Love et al 2001(Love et al , 2002Vogel et al 2010) Repeat birth within 36 months of the prior birth (24 months after enrollment) Variable • 0.19 • 0.38 • 0.01 Girl Talk (Katz et al 2011) Time to a repeat pregnancy or birth (24 months after enrollment) Longer• term NR Healthy Families America (Jacobs et al 2016) Repeat birth within 26 months of the prior birth (24 months after enrollment) Immediate NR Learning, Earning, and Parenting Program (Bos & Fellerath 1997) Gave (Olds et al 2002(Olds et al , 2004 (Kitzman et al 1997Olds et al 2004, 2010 Number of months between the births of first and second children (5 years after Longer• term NR* enrollment)…”

Discrimination and Ethnic–Racial Identity: Understanding Direction of Effects Using Within‐ and Between‐Person Analyses

“…Thus, our finding that discrimination can undermine adolescents’ ERI development is troubling because it implies that the very resource that can potentially protect youth against the deleterious effects of discrimination is threatened by the risk factor it can protect against. Specific to adolescent mothers, this may mean that prevention programs, which typically focus on supporting adolescent mothers’ parenting processes (e.g., Easterbrooks, Kotake, Raskin, & Bumgamer, ; Jacobs et al., ), should also consider adolescent mothers’ experiences that are not solely tied to their parenting status. Growing evidence suggests that parents’ discrimination experiences impact parent–child interactions and children's developmental outcomes (Zeiders, Umaña‐Taylor, Jahromi, Updegraff, & White, ).…”

A Parenting and Life Skills Intervention for Teen Mothers: A Randomized Controlled Trial

“…42 An evaluation of a home-visiting intervention showed positive effects on parenting stress, engagement in high risk behaviors, and college attendance at 24 months. 19 Positive effects on both parenting and repeat pregnancies are critical outcomes for teen parenting programs. Risk for poor outcomes for teens and their children increases with each additional repeat teen birth.…”

“…At baseline and 36 months, we found no significant differences between intervention and control groups in the characteristics of those with and without data. There was no difference in the number of teentot visits made by the 2 groups during the 36-month study period; the median (interquartile range) number of visits for control versus intervention group equaled 25 (18-38) vs 24 (16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24)(25)(26)(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32)(33)(34). There were no adverse events.…”

“…16 Programs are used to address parenting behaviors, maternal attachment to the infant, and teen life skills to enhance child developmental outcomes and teen self-sufficiency. 11,[16][17][18] Promising interventions include schoolbased 16,17 or home-visiting programs [18][19][20] and mentoring. [21][22][23] Other successful interventions have used the medical home or teen-tot model.…”