VIRTUAL MENTORSHIP TO SUPPORT MATERNAL AND INFANT HEALTH AND WELLBEING: UNDERSTANDING THE PARTICIPANT EXPERIENCE AND EVALUATING THE IMPACT OF NURTUREPA

University Of Michigan At Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor MI

Investigators

Abstract

Parents? interactions with their young children form the bedrock for school readiness and subsequent life success. However, new mothers in particular can struggle with increased stress and, not infrequently, depression, which can affect their interactions with their children. While some of the most at-risk mothers receive support from home visiting programs, or many families the transition to parenthood is a vulnerable and demanding period where the accumulation of unmitigated stressors can negatively impact healthy development for children and parents alike.Pittsburgh-based non-profit NurturePA has developed a text-based peer-to-peer mentorship program to provide social support for new parents. NurturePA seeks to promote the healthy development of young children by enhancing their mothers? parenting skills of the children?s parents and by reducing maternal stress. New mothers are paired with mentors, who use text messaging to communicate with, support, inform, and encourage them. While prior research has demonstrated that text-based nudges can lead to shifts in the behavior of college- bound students and of parents with school-aged children, this behavioral approach to intervention has not been broadly utilized or studied in populations of parents with young children. A study of the NurturePA program affords an opportunity to understand how this type of behavioral intervention can be used to support families with children aged zero-to-three.Presently, our study team has funding from a foundation to conduct a randomized controlled trial (RCT) with a target sample of 200 individuals (100 control and 100 treatment) to investigate the impact of NurturePA on maternal stress, maternal knowledge, and maternal engagement in language and literacy supportive practices at 4 and 12 months. In alignment with current NurturePA practices, we will recruit postpartum mothers from West Penn Hospital in Pittsburgh to participate in our investigation. We will track all participants over their first 12 months in the program. We expect to enroll a racially and socio-economically diverse group of participants.I will write a three- paper dissertation over a two-year project period that will add to the overarching study in several keys ways. Specifically, I will add a qualitative supplement to the study that will meet calls in the literature (Hall & Bierman, 2015) for more process data on how participants are interacting with behaviorally focused interventions. To do so, I will code and analyze interview data from key participants and text-based transcripts of participant-mentor interactions. I will also examine impacts of the program on key targeted outcomes and link implementation of the program and participant engagement to impacts on maternal stress, maternal knowledge, and maternal engagement in language and literacy supportive practices at four months (both at the four-month time point). Findings will add to the literature regarding whether behavioral interventions work with parents and crucially, on how parents engage with text-based behavioral interventions.