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Parenting for Lifelong Health for Young Children

Parenting for Lifelong Health for Young Children - Thailand is a collaboration between the University of Oxford, the Mahidol Oxford Research Unit, the University of Cape Town, the Thai Ministry of Public Health, and UNICEF Thailand.

Khun Tuk & family.
Khun Tuk & her family are participating in the project.

Violence against children is widely prevalent in Thailand, and has immediate and long-term adverse effects on physical and mental health. The goal of this study was to determine the cultural appropriateness and feasibility of the intervention in community-based hospital settings, and to assess intervention effectiveness in reducing the risk of violence against children, improving parental mental health, reducing child behavioural problems, and strengthening parent-child relationships.

The project involved the cultural adaptation and testing of an evidence-based parenting intervention for low-income families with children aged 2-9 years living in Udon Thani. 

The original version of this programme was developed and tested in Cape Town, South Africa, as a culturally-relevant intervention drawn from core components common to effective social learning theory-based parenting programmes, but mainly trialled in high-income countries. The purpose of this collaboration is to develop, test, and widely disseminate a suite of affordable and freely available parenting programmes in low- and middle-income country contexts. In Thailand, the goal of the study was to determine the cultural appropriateness and feasibility of the intervention in community-based hospital settings, and to assess intervention effectiveness in reducing the risk of violence against children, improving parental mental health, reducing child behavioural problems, and strengthening parent-child relationships. 

Findings from the recent randomized controlled trial (N=120) indicated that the programme reduced child maltreatment by 58%, harsh and abusive parenting by 44%, parental mental health problems by 40%, and child behaviour problems by 60% in the intervention group in comparison to a control condition of services as usual. The University of Oxford, the Ministry of Public Health, and UNICEF Thailand are currently planning to scale up the programme to a total of 7 provinces in Northeast Thailand.

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