Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a pervasive developmental disorder that has grown in prevalence over the past few decades and has a tremendous impact on families that struggle with adjustment to this disorder. Initial exposure to such a disorder may be a significant source of stress and tribulation for Chinese families who are not familiar with…

The Annie E. Casey Foundation's Family Economic Success-Early Childhood Education (FES-ECE) initiative, launched in October 2013, is rooted in the belief that families do better when programs can offer simultaneous support to children and parents. The report, designed to aid funders, is part of the Casey Foundation's ongoing commitment to sharing…

The Building Bridges and Bonds (B3) evaluation, a federally funded study of Responsible Fatherhood programs, is testing a set of three innovative approaches to help fathers with low income improve their parenting and employment skills. One innovation, Just Beginning (JB), was added to the existing fatherhood services at three community-based…

This article reviews the research base on the development of prenatal attachment and profiles four programs that foster this essential prenatal relationship: CenteringPregnancy®, the Practical Resources for Effective Postpartum Parenting program (PREPP), Mindfulness-Based Childbirth and Parenting (MBCP), and Moms2B.

This brief introduces the Building Bridges and Bonds study (B3) to practitioners and stakeholders in the fatherhood field. It describes three innovative practices for Responsible Fatherhood programs. Each innovation is practical and interactive and addresses issues important to low-income fathers. The B3 team selected them for their high potential…

Achieving reproductive health and justice matters to family and child well-being. These two ideals are, however, often put at odds in public policies and discourse that shape the systems and programs that affect pregnant women and families. This article describes the Irving Harris Foundation's historic approach to investing in early childhood and…

Research Findings: This within-group exploratory sequential mixed-methods investigation sought to identify how ethnically diverse, urban-residing, low-income Black families conceptualize positive parenting. During the item development phase 119 primary caregivers from Head Start programs participated in focus groups and interviews. These…

The Buffering Toxic Stress Consortium was created by the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation within the Administration for Children and Families to test preventive interventions for Early Head Start families facing toxic stress, as conceptualized by Shonkoff, Boyce, and McEwen in their influential 2009 article. Because relationships…

Research Findings: Supportive mother-child interactions promote the development of social-emotional competence. Poverty and other associated psychosocial risk factors have a negative impact on mother-child interaction. In spite of Latino children being disproportionately represented among children living in poverty, research on mother-child…

Pediatric health care represents an innovative platform for implementation of low-cost, population-wide, preventive interventions to improve school readiness. This article describes the Video Interaction Project, a targeted intervention in the pediatric primary care setting designed to enhance parenting skills and boost school readiness. The…

Surveys of 110 inner-city Hispanic adolescent girls referred for psychiatric assessment and their mothers found that the quality of mother/daughter communication in general was more useful in predicting onset of sexual experiences than aspects of later sexual experiences. However, specific communication about sexuality was not related to…

Describes the outreach services of an urban family health and social service organization catering to low-income young childbearing families in East Harlem, New York. Using an innovative multidisciplinary model, the organization's primary emphasis is on working with families in their own homes and eventually moving out into the community.…

This guide is intended to aid in the design of parent education courses for refugee and immigrant parents, especially those who are having problems in relations with their children. The presentation is based on the experience of three parent-education projects, each of which conducted an 8-week course for Cambodian refugees who were experiencing…

Describes impediments to and advantages of child welfare agencies' use of parents' groups in working with parents. Outlines five stages in the development of a parents' group as the stages were implemented in a group for biological parents conducted by a child welfare agency in Brooklyn, New York. (SM)

Puerto Rican children and adolescents appear more at risk for below average school achievement and for mental health problems and service referrals than other Hispanic youngsters. This study examined the cognitive style and the emotional and behavioral patterns associated with the personal adjustment of 80 Puerto Rican adolescents from…