A Randomized Trial of a Mentoring Program for High Risk Children

高危儿童辅导计划的随机试验

• 批准号: 7478732
• 负责人: John MARK EDDY
• 金额: $ 57.3万
• 依托单位: OREGON SOCIAL LEARNING CENTER, INC.
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2007-08-10 至 2012-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/7478732
• 关键词: Accounting; Address; Adult; Advocate; Age; Alcohol or Other Drugs use; Americas; Area; Attention; Behavior; Behavioral; Boston; Caregivers; Characteristics; Child; Cities; Communities; Condition; Conduct Disorder; Costs and Benefits; Country; Disease; Drops; Education; Effectiveness; Emotional; Employee; Enrollment; Ethnic Origin; Failure; Family; Female; Friends; Funding; Funding Agency; Gender; Goals; Housing; Indium; Individual; Intervention; Intervention Trial; Knowledge; Learning; Left; Literature; Longitudinal Studies; Mental Depression; Mental Health Services; Mentors; Minority; Oregon; Outcome; Outcome Study; Parents; Participant; Personal Satisfaction; Phase; Policies; Prevention; Prevention strategy; Preventive Intervention; Problem behavior; Process; Public Policy; Randomized; Randomized Controlled Clinical Trials; Randomized Controlled Trials; Records; Recruitment Activity; Research; Research Personnel; Resources; Risk; Risk Factors; Running; San Francisco; Schools; Screening procedure; Sex Behavior; Social Interaction; Societies; Student Dropouts; Substance abuse problem; Supervision; Teenagers; Thinking; Time; Training; United States Dept. of Health and Human Services; Work; Youth; base; cost; cost effectiveness; design; ethnic minority population; experience; girls; high school; inner city; interest; peer; programs; satisfaction; size; skills; social; success; symposium; teacher

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Mentoring is widely viewed as an effective preventive intervention for a variety of youth problems and consequences, including conduct disorder and delinquency, academic failure and school drop out, substance use and abuse, and early sexual behavior and teen parenthood. In recent years, there has been strong support for mentoring programs from policymakers at the local, state, and federal levels. While there have been a variety of outcome studies on mentoring, and mentoring appears to have at least small, positive effects on youth in the short run, little is known about the long term influence of programs on the "high risk" children assumed to need mentoring the most, and almost nothing is known about how characteristics and qualities of the mentoring relationship are related to youth outcomes. We propose to conduct a longitudinal randomized controlled preventive intervention trial designed to assess the impacts of an established, privately funded, long term, intensive youth mentoring program called Friends of the Children (FOTC). FOTC partners with inner city public schools to identify and enroll kindergarten-age children thought to be at high risk for conduct disorder, academic failure, and teen parenthood due to serious levels and/or combinations of individual and family risk factors. FOTC mentors, called "Friends", are paid, full time employees who are rigorously trained and supervised. Friends work with not more than eight children at a time. Through FOTC, children are exposed to a variety of skill building and recreational experiences and assisted in accessing resources in a variety of areas, including academic and physical and mental health services. Participants for the study (N = 256; 80% minority, 50% girls) will be recruited through existing programs located within impoverished, inner city areas of Boston; San Francisco; Seattle; and Portland, Oregon. Children will be randomly assigned to either FOTC or a referral control condition. Children, their primary caregivers, and Friends will be assessed prior to program initiation in kindergarten, and during each subsequent year through the end of third grade. On an annual basis, primary teachers will be assessed; direct observations of Friend-child social interaction will be conducted; and school and FOTC program records will be collected. At each assessment, information will be collected on child behavioral, emotional, and academic adjustment, as well as on the quality and characteristics of child-peer, child-caregiver relations, child-Friend, and child-other adult (i.e., natural mentor) relationships. Analyses will examine child outcomes overtime; the impact of Friend-child relationship quality on program satisfaction, engagement, and persistence as well as on child outcomes; and differential effectiveness based on ethnicity, child gender, and baseline risk status. The findings from this study will have important implications for mentoring practice and policy.

描述（由申请人提供）：辅导被广泛认为是针对各种青少年问题和后果的有效预防性干预措施，包括行为障碍和犯罪、学业失败和辍学、药物使用和滥用以及早期性行为和青少年父母身份。近年来，地方、州和联邦各级政策制定者对指导计划给予了大力支持。虽然对辅导进行了各种结果研究，并且辅导似乎在短期内至少对青少年产生了微小的积极影响，但人们对这些计划对被认为需要的“高风险”儿童的长期影响知之甚少。指导最多，但对于指导关系的特征和质量如何与青年成果相关，几乎一无所知。我们建议进行一项纵向随机对照预防性干预试验，旨在评估一项名为“儿童之友”(FOTC) 的既定、私人资助、长期、强化青少年辅导计划的影响。 FOTC 与内城区公立学校合作，识别并招收因个人和家庭风险因素严重程度和/或组合而被认为具有行为障碍、学业失败和青少年父母身份高风险的幼儿园适龄儿童。 FOTC 导师被称为“朋友”，是受过严格培训和监督的带薪全职员工。朋友们一次与不超过八个孩子一起工作。通过 FOTC，儿童可以接触到各种技能培养和娱乐体验，并协助他们获取各个领域的资源，包括学术和身心健康服务。该研究的参与者（N = 256；80% 是少数族裔，50% 是女孩）将通过位于波士顿贫困内城区的现有项目招募；旧金山；西雅图；和俄勒冈州波特兰。儿童将被随机分配到 FOTC 或转诊控制条件组。儿童、他们的主要照顾者和朋友将在幼儿园项目启动之前以及随后的每一年直至三年级结束时接受评估。每年将对小学教师进行评估；将直接观察亲子社交互动；学校和 FOTC 计划记录将被收集。每次评估时，将收集有关儿童行为、情感和学业调整的信息，以及儿童与同伴、儿童与照顾者关系、儿童与朋友以及儿童与其他成人（即自然导师）的质量和特征的信息。 ）关系。分析将检查儿童的长期成果；亲子关系质量对项目满意度、参与度、持久性以及儿童成果的影响；以及基于种族、儿童性别和基线风险状态的不同有效性。这项研究的结果将对指导实践和政策产生重要影响。