PARENT/CHILD PHYSICAL ABUSE TREATMENT PROGRAM

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DESCRIPTION (Adapted from applicant's abstract): The physical abuse of children by their parents continues to be a major social problem in our country. However, there has been relatively little attention given to empirical approaches to the treatment of physically abusive families. A careful examination of the current literature suggests that abusive parents are characterized by high rates of negative interaction, low rates of positive interaction, and limited/ineffective parental disciplining strategies. Conversely, physically abused children have been reported to be aggressive, defiant, non-compliant, and resistant to parental direction. Utilizing a social learning framework, this proposal argues that abusive parents and their children engage in a negative coercive cycle which characterizes many of their interactions. At times, this cycle may escalate to the point of physical abuse. This proposal describes the Parent Child Interaction Training (PCIT) as an intervention which targets specific deficits often found within physically abusive parent-child dyads. PCIT is uniquely appropriate with physically abusive parent-child dyads because it has been shown to be highly effective with a similar population (i.e., oppositional, defiant children), it incorporates both the parent and the child, it provides a means to alter the pattern of interactions within abusive relationships, and it provides a means to directly decrease negative affect and control-while promoting (i.e., teaching, coaching) greater positive affect and discipline strategies. Therefore, this project proposes to use a sample of 48 parent-child dyads (mothers and their children) who have been referred to Family Preservation Services and therefore have been identified as having physically abusive relationships. Parent-child dyads will be administered a brief screen, blocked by ethnicity, then randomly assigned to either a PCIT treatment group (N=24) or to a comparison group (N =24) who will receive 'traditional' family preservation services). It is hypothesized that dyads in the PCIT treatment group will have higher rates of parental verbal praise, parental positive physical contact, greater child compliance, and decreasing rates of child deviant behaviors; than dyads in the comparison treatment group. Additionally, it is predicted that parents in the PCIT treatment group will report less perceived parental stress than parents in the comparison group.