Single Black Mothers: Work, Mental Health, Parenting

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This exploratory/developmental study, a revision of application #1 R21 MH66846-01, proposes to examine the relations between and among maternal psychological functioning, parenting, and child outcomes in a sample of 120 employed and nonemployed, single, black mothers and their young children (ages 3-4 years old) in Pittsburgh who receive (and have received) welfare benefits. It then proposes to develop a psychoeducational group intervention as a counteraction against the high risk in this population (of mothers) for poor psychological functioning, to facilitate more supportive and cognitively stimulating parenting and, thereby, better child outcomes over time. As such, it is a logical extension of our earlier work on the associations among objective economic circumstances, maternal and child characteristics, family processes, and child developmental outcomes. Support is requested to conduct a preliminary examination of the longitudinal impact of the proposed intervention on maternal parenting adequacy and child cognitive and behavioral outcomes over one to two years. Specific aims are to: 1) elicit information about the mothers' economic circumstances (sources of income, financial strain, and, if employed, working hours and hourly pay), psychological functioning (depressive symptoms, self-efficacy beliefs, parenting stress), parenting practices in the home environment, networks of support, barriers to employment (including child-care resources), and the children's preschool readiness; 2) develop a treatment protocol and manual for a psychoeducational intervention that will engage mothers, provide support, enhance psychological functioning, and facilitate more adequate parenting based on proven psychoeducational principles, theory, and empirical evidence; 3) test longitudinally the success/effectiveness of this intervention over one to two years on emotionally supportive and cognitively stimulating parenting; and 4) test the relationship between more adequate parenting early on and better cognitive and behavioral development in children in kindergarten and early-elementary school. At baseline, mothers will be interviewed in their homes and assigned randomly to an ongoing psychoeducational group (n = 60) or a control group (n = 60). Mothers in the control group will get a telephone call every 6 months for tracking purposes (with referrals for help if needed or requested). We will test two hypotheses: 1) mothers who participate in the psychoeducational group intervention will demonstrate better psychological functioning and more supportive and cognitively stimulating parenting than those who do not; and 2) children who get more supportive and cognitively stimulating parenting in the preschool years (in comparison to those who do not) will score higher on a measure of adaptive language and lower on a measure of behavior problems in kindergarten and early-elementary school. We intend to use these data, including ongoing process evaluations from the mothers in the psychoeducational groups, to refine the intervention and address important analytic questions that will become the focus of a larger RO1 proposal.