Helping families help themselves: The (Un)intended impacts of a digital parenting program

Sofia Amaral; Lelys Dinarte-Diaz; Patricio Dominguez; Santiago M. Perez-Vincent

Woman hugging her daughter

• Education

October 6, 2023

Parenting practices play a crucial role in child development. We evaluate the impact of a free digital stress management and positive parenting intervention designed to improve caregiver’s mental health and positive caregiver–child interactions in El Salvador. Drawing on the prior success of in-person interventions, we study the effects of digital intervention delivery and examine differential treatment effects by caregiver’s sex. Using an individual-level experiment, we find that the intervention increased stress and anxiety and lowered caregiver–child interactions among male caregivers. In contrast, among female caregivers, we did not detect changes in mental health and observed a decrease in the use of physical violence against children. We also find that family structure and the severity of economic deprivation greatly moderated the intervention’s impact, especially among male caregivers. Our findings indicate that one-size-fits-all digital parenting interventions may not serve all caregivers effectively, emphasizing the need for thorough evaluations prior to extensive implementation.

Keywords:
Mental Health, Positive Parenting, Parental Stress, Child Maltreatment

DOI:
10.1016/j.jdeveco.2023.103181

How to Cite?

Our work is important, so we appreciate it if you cite the use of the code and figures available in this repository.

APA Citation

MIGRA, N. (2024). MIGRA Repository (Version 2.0.4) [Computer software].

BibTeX Citation

@software{MIGRA_Repositorio_MIGRA_2024,
  author = {MIGRA, NÚCLEO},
  month = may,
  title = {MIGRA Repository},
  version = {2.0.4},
  year = {2024}
}