RAPID: Exploring the Effects of Parent-Child Interactions on Children’s Learning about Handwashing Behavior and Disease Prevention

这个RAPID项目将研究儿童的卫生习惯与学习诸如疾病传播科学等科学知识之间的联系。它建立在研究者先前在儿童博物馆观察到的亲子互动研究的基础上，并将把这项研究扩展到家庭环境。本研究的重点是了解目标设定，无论是父母指导，儿童指导还是共同指导，如何影响儿童参与洗手活动，以及他们随后对洗手行为和预防疾病传播的学习。更具体地说，目的是研究在父母和孩子之间的互动演示过程中，目标设定与孩子对活动的回忆和之后的洗手行为之间的关系。该项目由推进非正式STEM学习（AISL）计划资助，该计划旨在推进非正式环境中STEM学习的设计和开发的新方法和基于证据的理解。在大流行期间，儿童必须养成良好的卫生习惯，并了解洗手对预防疾病传播的重要性。最重要的是，幼儿应经常洗手，并养成良好的卫生习惯，如洗手时使用肥皂。这项研究考察了父母在鼓励孩子洗手方面可能发挥的作用。项目团队开发了一个10分钟的简短干预，家长和孩子可以在使用日常家居用品时参与其中。利用远程技术，父母和孩子将在视频记录下他们的行为的同时指导他们进行干预。家庭将有一个结构化的活动，让父母和孩子一起参与。该活动将重点关注洗手，特别是洗手时使用肥皂如何帮助防止细菌传播。亲子互动将使用研究者在先前工作中制定的目标设定方案进行编码。在参与活动后和一周后，将要求儿童对活动进行反思，以了解他们对活动的记忆，并了解他们是否理解了洗手对预防疾病传播的重要性。家长还将被要求跟踪孩子的洗手情况，看看这些反映的各个方面，以及父母和孩子在活动中互动方式的个体差异，是否会促进更好的洗手行为。产生的数据将使研究人员能够制定以儿童洗手和预防疾病传播为中心的干预措施的最佳做法。了解这些做法对于儿童重新融入学校和儿童博物馆等社会环境至关重要。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This RAPID project will study connections between children's hygiene habits and learning about science, such as the science of disease transmission. It builds upon findings from the investigator’s prior research of parent-child interactions observed in children’s museums and will extend this research to home settings. This research will focus on understanding how goal-setting, whether it is parent-directed, child-directed, or jointly-directed, affects children’s engagement with a handwashing activity and their subsequent learning about handwashing behavior and preventing the spread of disease. More specifically, the intent is to examine how goal-setting during an interactive demonstration between parents and children relates to children’s recollection of the activity and their handwashing behavior afterwards. This project is funded by the Advancing Informal STEM Learning (AISL) program which seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of STEM learning in informal environments. During a pandemic, it is vital that children establish good hygiene habits and understand the importance of handwashing for the prevention of disease transmission. What is most important is that young children wash their hands frequently and follow good hygiene habits, such as using soap, when doing so. This study examines the role parents might play in engaging children to wash their hands. The project team has developed a short 10 minute intervention that parents and children can participate in while using everyday household items. Utilizing remote technology, parents and children will be guided through this intervention while video recording their behavior. Families will be presented with a structured activity for parents and children to participate in together. This activity will be focused on how handwashing, and particularly the use of soap during handwashing, helps prevent the spread of germs. Parent-child interactions will be coded using schemes for goal setting that the investigator developed in prior work. Directly after their participation and one week later, children will be asked to reflect on the activity to understand what they remember about it, and to understand whether they have encoded the importance of handwashing for preventing the transmission of disease. Parents will also be asked to track their children’s handwashing to see whether aspects of these reflections, as well as individual differences in how parents and children interact during the activity, promote better engagement with handwashing. The data generated will allow researchers to develop best practices for interventions centered on children’s handwashing and the prevention of disease transmission. Knowing such practices is critical for reintegrating children into social settings such as schools and children's museums.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.