Evaluation of the Parental Support Intervention For Our Children's Sake in Prisons in Sweden

Not Applicable

Completed

• Conditions: Parenting; Parent-Child Relations
• Interventions: Behavioral: For Our Children's Sake; Other: Active control

• Registration Number: NCT04101799
• Lead Sponsor: Karolinska Institutet

Brief Summary

Evaluation of the effects of the parental support intervention "For our children's sake" on positive parenting outcomes when conducted with incarcerated parents in prisons in Sweden.

Detailed Description

Children of incarcerated parents comprise a greatly disadvantaged group in society with elevated risk of ill-health, behavioural problems, and own delinquency and unemployment later in life. Positive parenting comprise an important factor for children's positive and healthy development. Incarcerated parents may have difficulties to engage in positive parenting due to disadvantaged situations affecting parenting negatively such as drug addiction, poverty, or lack of experience of positive parenting in their own childhood. Previous research has suggested that interventions to prevent the intergenerational effect of criminality should be targeting family factors where positive parenting has been emphasised. Internationally developed parenting interventions for incarcerated parents suggest an impact on parenting outcomes such as positive parent-child interaction, parenting knowledge, empathy, parent stress, increased child contact and active parenting, However, the majority of the programmes evaluated to date have been conducted in the US, with a prison and probation context with limited generalisability to the Swedish system. In Sweden, the parenting programme for incarcerated parents, "For our children's' sake" (FOCS) was developed in 2012-2014 with the aim to support positive parenting for the child's healthy development and is currently delivered in Swedish prisons. The aim of this project is to evaluate the effects of the FOCS parenting programme on parenting outcomes through a controlled trial with a parallel implementation process evaluation.

Study Timeline

• Study First Submitted: 2019-09-20
• Study Start: 2019-09-21
• Study First Submitted QC: 2019-09-23
• Study First Posted: 2019-09-24
• Primary Completion: 2020-06-30
• Study Completion: 2020-06-30
• Status Verified: 2020-09
• Last Update Submitted: 2020-09-22
• Last Update Posted: 2020-09-23

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: COMPLETED
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 91

Inclusion Criteria

• Serving a sentence at any of the included prisons
• Having at least one child in the ages between 0-18 years. Parents of children aged 0-2 and 13-18 years will not be included in the primary outcome measure, as the measure is not developed for these age groups. These parents will be included in the mediator measurements.
• Are in contact with their child/children in any form. If not, these parents are included in the mediator measurements, as the primary outcome: relationship quality, is not applicable.
• Having the legal right to contact the child
• Not committed either a crime against the child or any violent crime against the other parent

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Exclusion Criteria

• Not fulfilling inclusion criteria

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Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: PARALLEL

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Intervention	For Our Children's Sake	Participating in the For our children's sake intervention, 10 group sessions, 2 hours each
Control	Active control	Participating in everyday activities that may include parenting activities in the control prisons

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
7-items sub-scale Closeness in the Child Parent Relationship Scale	Positive change in mean score of all 7 items between baseline (pre-intervention) and end of intervention, after 10 weeks. Measurements will also be conducted at mid-intervention to investigate mediated effects, and a 3-month post intervention follow-up.	Parent-reported quality in relationship between parent and child on a 5-point scale ('complete agree' to 'completely disagree')

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Parent interest in other treatment programmes in prison	Change in item score between baseline (pre-intervention) and end of intervention, after 10 weeks. Measurements will also be conducted at a 3-month post intervention follow-up.	One item self-reported on an 11-point scale (0 no interest, 10 very high interest)
Contact frequency and type between parent and child	Change in mean score of items between baseline (pre-intervention) and end of intervention, after 10 weeks. Measurements will also be conducted at a 3-month post intervention follow-up.	Parent-reported frequency (weekly, monthly, less, no contact) and type (letter, telephone, visit/permission, other
Eight items chosen from the sub-scale antisocial intent in the Measures of Criminal Attitudes and Associates scale	Change in mean score of items between baseline (pre-intervention) and end of intervention, after 10 weeks. Measurements will also be conducted at a 3-month post intervention follow-up.	Parental attitude to criminality self-reported on a 5-point scale ('complete agree' to 'completely disagree')

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

Karolinska Institutet; 🇸🇪 Stockholm, Sweden