Early Steps Multisite Study (Condition Files), Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Eugene, Oregon, and Charlottesville, Virginia, 2002-2014 (ICPSR 38755)

Time Period(s) View help for Time Period(s)

Data Collection Notes View help for Data Collection Notes

Study Purpose View help for Study Purpose

The purpose of this study is to test the efficacy of the early childhood version of the Family Check-Up (FCU) intervention in preventing substance use and other high-risk problem behaviors from toddlerhood through adolescence by enhancing parenting. The FCU incorporates motivational interviewing to provide parents with direct feedback about their child's and family's behavior using data from longitudinal studies to inform feedback about each family's strengths and challenges. The study examines how reduction in these adolescent problem behaviors is mediated by improvement in parenting and peer environments and is moderated by the family ecology and genetic risk.

Study Design View help for Study Design

Primary Caregivers, Target Children, and Alternate Caregivers when available were scheduled for a 2.5-hour home assessment when children were between 2 years and 2 years 11 months old. The home assessment involved a series of interactive tasks and caregivers completed numerous questionnaires, including instruments assessing demographic information, maternal well-being, parenting, and child psychosocial adjustment.

The home visit protocol was repeated nearly annually at ages 3, 4, 5, 7.5, 8.5, 9.5 and 10.5. Randomization to the intervention condition was balanced on gender to assure an equal number of males and females in the control and intervention groups. The examiner was blind to intervention status during the assessments, and opened a sealed envelope revealing the family's group assignment after the home assessment was completed. Examiners who completed followup assessments were not informed of the family's assigned group until the end of the visit.

Families received $100, $120, $140, $160, $180, $90, $200, $150 and $160 for participating in each home assessments, respectively.

Children's teachers completed questionnaires on topics such as target children's socioemotional and behavioral functioning as well as their relationships with the target children after the ages 7.5, 8.5, 9.5, and 10.5 home visits. Children's aftercare providers completed similar measures after the ages 7.5, 8.5, and 9.5 assessments. Teachers were paid $35 at ages 7.5-10.5; Aftercare providers were paid $30 at each wave.

Families randomly assigned to the FCU intervention met with a parent consultant for two or more assessment and feedback sessions, depending on the family's preference when their child was 2 years old, and again when their child was 3 years old. Parent consultants were highly trained masters- or doctoral-level clinicians with backgrounds typically in social work, counseling, or clinical psychology.

Sample View help for Sample

The sample includes families enrolled in Women, Infants, and Children Nutritional Supplement (WIC) Programs at three jurisdictions in the US for which the target child needed to be between 2 and 3 years of age at the time of enrollment. Families were invited to participate if they had a child between 2 years 0 months and 2 years 11 months of age, following a screening to ensure that they met study criteria by having family, socioeconomic, and/or child risk factors for future behavioral problems. Families were eligible to participate if they scored at least one standard deviation above the normative mean in at least two of the three domains of risk: a) familial risk (e.g., maternal depressive symptoms, b) socio-demographic risk (e.g., low parental education), and c) child risk (e.g., conduct problems).

Of the 1,666 families who had children in the appropriate age range and were approached at WIC programs across the three study sites, 879 met eligibility requirements (52% in Pittsburgh, 57% in Eugene, and 49% in Charlottesville) and 731 (83.2 %) agreed to participate (88% in Pittsburgh, 84% in Eugene, 76% in Charlottesville). Before the first home assessment at age 2, families were randomly assigned to the FCU or control conditions, the latter receiving WIC services as usual.

At the time of recruitment, primary caregivers across sites self-identified as European American (50%), African American (28%), biracial (13%), and other groups (9%; e.g., American Indian, Native Hawaiian), with 13.4% of the sample reported being Hispanic American. The primary caregivers who participated in the assessment tasks at age 2 were predominantly biological mothers (96%), and in all other cases, were biological fathers, grandmothers, or other non-maternal custodial caregivers. The sample was primarily of lower socioeconomic status, with more than two-thirds of the families enrolled in the project reporting an annual income less than $20,000. Forty-one percent of primary caregivers had a high school diploma or general education diploma (GED) and an additional 32% had 1-2 years of post-high school training. For more information about sample characteristics, see Dishion et al. (2008).

Time Method View help for Time Method

Universe View help for Universe

The sample includes families enrolled in Women, Infants, and Children Nutritional Supplement (WIC) Programs at three jurisdictions in the US for which the target child needed to be between 2 and 3 years of age at the time of enrollment.

Unit(s) of Observation View help for Unit(s) of Observation

Data Type(s) View help for Data Type(s)

Mode of Data Collection View help for Mode of Data Collection

Description of Variables View help for Description of Variables

The data contains variables about target children's ages at different assessments and their ethnicities. It also contains information about caregivers' genders and their relationship to the target children.

Response Rates View help for Response Rates

Of the 1,666 families who had children in the appropriate age range and were approached at WIC programs across the three study sites, 879 met eligibility requirements (52% in Pittsburgh, 57% in Eugene, and 49% in Charlottesville) and 731 (83.2 %) agreed to participate (88% in Pittsburgh, 84% in Eugene, 76% in Charlottesville). Before the first home assessment at age 2, families were randomly assigned to the FCU or control conditions, the latter receiving WIC services as usual.

Presence of Common Scales View help for Presence of Common Scales

Established instruments including the Achenbach Child Behavior Checklist and accompanying Teacher Report Form, the Center of Epidemiological Study - Depression (CES-D), Crnic and Greenberg General Life Satisfaction scale, Crnic and Greenberg Parenting Daily Hassles scale, Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory.

Original Release Date View help for Original Release Date

2024-01-08