The goal of this Phase II project, ADAPT Online (After Deployment: Adaptive Parenting Tools), is to strengthen family functioning and improve child outcomes in reintegrating military families. By developing an empirically supported, standalone, web-based parenting intervention for military families with school-aged children, we expect to strengthen parenting practices in families and prevent behavioral and emotional maladjustment in children. ADAPT Online responds to the urgent parenting needs of military families potentially at risk for depression, anxiety, substance abuse, mental illness, post-traumatic stress, and other maladies. ADAPT Online is founded on a well-validated theory-based approach, Parent Management Training, Oregon Model (PMTO). In Phase I, we developed and successfully tested modules on emotional regulation and basic parenting skills. In Phase II, we will complete the program by adding PMTO modules. The Principal Investigators have extensive grant-management experience;project team members have years of experience in translational research involving media and Internet technologies. IRIS Media, a recipient of 12 Telly media awards, maintains an active parent-training product line. The project benefits from participation by scientists from the University of Minnesota's Department of Family Social Science, Oregon Social Learning Center, Department of Veteran Affairs, Department of Defense's National Center for Telehealth and Technology, and the Services University of the Health Sciences. Drs. Gerald Patterson and Marion Forgatch, key developers of PMTO, will provide expert consultation. ADAPT Online will be the first evidence-based, web-based program providing skills training to military parents. By delivering this material over the Internet, acces to this type of intervention will be greatly expanded and available to parents, therapists and organizations who serve military families. Program development includes focus groups, consultant input and review, usability testing, and a randomized waitlist-controlled trial (N=170) that will test the efficacy of ADAPT Online to reduce parent stress, increase positive parenting skills, and improve child behavior. The necessary institutional support, equipment and physical resources are available to develop and disseminate the program. IRIS has a history of completing Phase I and Phase II SBIR projects and prides itself on its commitment to commercializing training interventions. The proposed Phase II project is expected to make an important contribution to the field of parenting interventions, and-most importantly-fill a critica gap in existing interventions that currently leaves the very specific needs of parents returning from deployment and their partners/spouses as well as children unmet. Building on a solid history of commercializing media-based training programs, ADAPT Online has the potential to become a widely used program that effectively addresses the needs of military families.
The stress of military deployment to combat zones and subsequent re-integration can disrupt family functioning at home and lead to negative outcomes for children and parents that include depression, anxiety substance abuse, mental illness, and other maladies. Thus, the overarching goal of this project, ADAPT Online: After Deployment Adaptive Parenting Tools, is to develop an innovative, internet-based delivery format to address the unique needs of families of re-integrating service members.
| Gewirtz, Abigail H (2018) A Call for Theoretically Informed and Empirically Validated Military Family Interventions. Fam Relat 10:587-601 |
