142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

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313952
An Evaluation of Three Positive Parenting Practices and Their Combined Impact on Developmental, Social, or Behavioral Delays in Children Ages 1-5 in the United States

142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition (November 15 - November 19, 2014): http://www.apha.org/events-and-meetings/annual
Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Sarah Cprek, MPH , College of Public Health, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY
Corrine Williams, ScD , Department of Health Behavior, College of Public Health; Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, College of Medicine, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY
Ibitola Asaolu, MPH , College of Public Health, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY
Linda Alexander, EdD , Department of Health Behavior, University of Kentucky College of Public Health, Lexington, KY
Robin C. Vanderpool, DrPH, CHES , Department of Health Behavior, University of Kentucky College of Public Health, Lexington, KY
Objectives: (1) Evaluate whether three individual positive parenting practices (PPP) – reading to children, engaging in storytelling or singing, and eating meals together as a family – decrease the risk of developmental, behavioral, or social delays among children between the ages of 1-5 years in the United States. (2) Evaluate if a combination of these parenting practices has an additive effect on the outcome.

Methods: Multiple logistic regression and chi-square analyses were used to analyze data from the National Survey of Children’s Health 2011/2012 in regards to the relationship between each of the three individual PPP as well as a total PPP score and the child’s risk of being developmentally, socially, or behaviorally delayed (N=24,875).  These analyses controlled for poverty and parental education.  All analyses were completed using SAS Version 9.3.

Results: A strong correlation was found between each of the three PPP as well as the total PPP score and the child’s risk of developmental, social, or behavioral delays (p<0.05 for each test).  These associations were found to have a dose-response relationship (p<0.05 in all but one analysis).

Conclusions: This study found that parents engaging in daily PPP could possibly reduce the risk of delay in young children.  Furthermore, we found that engaging in all three PPP daily has an additive effect in reducing risk of delays.  Limitations of this study include its cross-sectional design, as well as potential recall and social desirability biases.

Learning Areas:

Advocacy for health and health education
Public health or related education
Social and behavioral sciences

Learning Objectives:
Evaluate whether three specific positive parenting practices (PPP) – reading to children, engaging in storytelling or singing, and eating meals together as a family – decrease the risk of developmental, behavioral, or social delays among children between the ages of 1-5 years in the U.S. A secondary purpose was to evaluate if the combination of these parenting practices had an additive effect on the outcome.

Keyword(s): Child Health Promotion, Literacy

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I presented this study at the University of Kentucky's Center for Clinical and Translational Science Annual Conference and won first place in the category of Public Health.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.