A new Mathematica report published through the Administration for Children and Families reports on the ongoing Assessing Models of Coordinated Services (AMCS) project. The project seeks to elevate successful approaches in coordinating early care and education services with other kinds of family-supporting efforts, addressing well-known challenges around ensuring families can access all the services for … Read more
A new ACF literature review sought to identify factors influencing family engagement in early childhood home visiting programs. Synthesizing findings across 36 manuscripts, the authors found that engagement was supported by scheduling flexibility, relevance of program content to families, and a supportive and trusting visitor-family relationship. A positive dynamic between home visitors and families can … Read more
A recent paper examines how a parenting program’s tiered approach might influence program attendance. Based in two urban hospitals, 201 mothers of infants attended the universal, prevention-focused intervention, with a subset of 90 higher-risk mothers eligible for a more intensive targeted intervention. Mothers with low educational attainment and parenting efficacy were more likely to attend. … Read more
Researchers at Child Trends used a new simulation tool to better understand the longterm effects of two-generation programming on young children. Simulations were conducted with data from a national sample of families (n = 400,040) with incomes under 200 percent of the poverty line. The tool allowed researchers to manipulate early childhood conditions by adjusting … Read more
To better understand what parents in recovery need from a parenting support program, researchers at the University of North Carolina interviewed 19 parents who are, or are partnered with, someone in alcohol use recovery. Interviewees were mostly female (n=13) and most often identified as Black (n=13). When asked about the relevance of traditional parenting-in-recovery programs, … Read more
A new paper in the Journal of Family Issues explores Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) with a recognition that existing research on ACEs can be overly focused on the experiences of middle-class white children. In response, the author uses data from the Longitudinal Studies of Child Abuse and Neglect (LONGSCAN) dataset, which contains information from more … Read more
Researchers at the Rural and Minority Health Research Center at the University of South Carolina have released their analysis of the National Survey of Children’s Health in which they explore the prevalence of three interactive caregiving activities—reading, storytelling/singing, and sharing meals—among children under age 5, with attention to differences across the income spectrum. The authors … Read more
Families affected by substance use disorders (SUDs) often experience barriers to home visiting program engagement, including a lack of transportation or child care, feeling judged or stigmatized by providers, and fear of custody loss. Importantly, previous research has found that among women with SUDs, their subjective experience of a home visiting program is key to … Read more
A new research brief takes stock of efforts to coordinate early childhood education systems with other kinds of family services including income supports and parent-focused services, often with a two-generation lens. These “coordinated service models” are not yet common, so the researchers interviewed 18 leaders of such efforts around the country, aiming to identify promising … Read more
Early results of the groundbreaking Baby’s First Years study have been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The study is the nation’s first randomized control trial aiming to measure the causal impacts of poverty reduction strategies on children in early life, with this first study focused on infant brain activity. One … Read more
