Does Giving Parents Their Choice of Interventions for Child Behavior Problems Improve Child Outcomes?
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| Abstract | :  Empowering consumers to be active decision-makers in their own care is a core tenet of personalized, or precision medicine. Nonetheless, there is a dearth of research on intervention preferences in families seeking interventions for a child with behavior problems. Specifically, the evidence is inconclusive as to whether providing parents with choice of intervention improves child/youth outcomes (i.e., reduces externalizing problems). In this study, 129 families presenting to community mental health clinics for child conduct problems were enrolled in a doubly randomized preference study and initially randomized to choice or no-choice conditions. Families assigned to the choice condition were offered their choice of intervention from among three different formats of the Parent Management Training-Oregon Model/PMTO (group, individual clinic, home based) and services-as-usual (child-focused therapy). Those assigned to the no-choice condition were again randomized, to one of the four intervention conditions. Intent-to-treat analyses revealed partial support for the effect of parental choice on child intervention outcomes. Assignment to the choice condition predicted teacher-reported improved child hyperactivity/inattention outcomes at 6 months post-treatment completion. No main effect of choice on parent reported child outcomes was found. Moderation analyses indicated that among parents who selected PMTO, teacher report of hyperactivity/inattention was significantly improved compared with parents selecting SAU, and compared with those assigned to PMTO within the no-choice condition. Contrary to hypotheses, teacher report of hyperactivity/inattention was also significantly improved for families assigned to SAU within the no-choice condition, indicating that within the no-choice condition, SAU outperformed the parenting interventions. Implications for prevention research are discussed. | 
| Year of Publication | :  2018 | 
| Journal | :  Prevention science : the official journal of the Society for Prevention Research | 
| Date Published | :  2018 | 
| ISSN Number | :  1389-4986 | 
| URL | :  https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11121-018-0865-x | 
| DOI | :  10.1007/s11121-018-0865-x | 
| Short Title | :  Prev Sci | 
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