Education Center for Adoptive Parents Online

描述(由申请人提供)：在过去的三十年里，美国的收养实践发生了巨大的变化，养父母在抚养孩子方面面临着一系列复杂的问题。研究人员一直发现，在领养的年轻人中，行为问题和心理失调的比例不成比例，这增加了养父母面临的挑战。有证据表明，养育能力是领养儿童适应的主要中介因素，这促使专家们呼吁进行有效和可接受的领养教育。尽管有这样的呼吁，但许多养父母不确定自己是否有能力有效地为人父母。普遍的育儿教育缺乏专门针对收养家庭的需要和兴趣的内容，针对养父母的教育资源不容易获得，往往包含不准确的信息，并且几乎没有提供练习和保持技能的机会。对养育教育的迫切需求是可获得的、研究证实的，并为养父母提供所需的知识和技能。该项目的中心目标是通过创建和评估专门为养父母量身定做的父母培训计划-养父母在线教育中心(ECAPO)，提高养父母的能力，并最终促进领养儿童的长期健康适应。以清晰的理论框架为基础，ECAPO家长培训材料将针对已知的调解风险对收养儿童结果的影响的因素，并将通过创新的网络交付平台(IRISedOnline)使用一套独特的技能培养教学组件在线提供。IRISedOnline的一个独特功能是，它将使收养服务提供商能够将ECAPO纳入其现有网站，以补充和提高他们有效地为收养家庭提供服务的能力。在第一阶段，我们将开发第一个程序模块：关于家庭收养相关问题的沟通，并通过检查其对养父母知识、沟通、态度、行为意图、自我效能和消费者接受的影响来评估这个原型的可行性。在第一阶段确定可行性将确保将其教学和技术方法成功地扩展到第二阶段的工作。在第二阶段，我们将通过进行一项大型随机对照试验来测试整个培训资源的有效性，比较干预组和等待名单对照的结果。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Dramatic changes have taken place in adoption practice in the U.S. over the last three decades, leaving adoptive parents with a complex set of issues in raising their children. Researchers consistently find a disproportionate rate of behavior problems and psychological maladjustment among adopted youth, adding to the challenges adoptive parents face. Evidence suggests that parenting competence is a primary mediator in adopted children's adjustment, prompting experts to call for effective and accessible adoptive parenting education. Despite this call, many adoptive parents are uncertain about their ability to parent effectively. Generalized parenting education lacks content that is specific to the needs and interests of adoptive families, and educational resources targeted to adoptive parents are not easily accessible, often containing inaccurate information, and providing little opportunity for the practice and maintenance of skills. There is a compelling need for adoptive parenting education that is accessible, research validated, and that provides adoptive parents with needed knowledge and skills. The central aim of this project is to enhance the competence of adoptive parents, and ultimately advance the long-term healthy adjustment of adopted children, by creating and evaluating a parent- training program uniquely tailored to adoptive parents, The Education Center for Adoptive Parents Online (ECAPO). Grounded in a clear theoretical framework, ECAPO parent training materials will target factors known to mediate the effects of risk on adopted children's outcomes, and will be delivered online using a unique set of skill-building instructional components through an innovative web delivery platform (IRISedOnline). A unique feature of IRISedOnline is that it will enable adoption service providers to incorporate ECAPO into their existing websites to complement and improve their capacity to effectively serve adoptive families. In Phase I, we will develop the first program module: Communication about adoption-related issues in the family, and evaluate the feasibility of this prototype by examining its impact on adoptive parent knowledge, communication, attitudes, behavioral intentions, self-efficacy, and consumer acceptance. Establishing feasibility in Phase I will ensure the successful extension of its instructional and technological approach to the Phase II effort. In Phase II, we will test the efficacy of the entire training resource by conducting a large randomized controlled trial comparing outcomes from the intervention group to a wait-list control.