Behavioral Science for Parenting Programs
Behavioral science is increasingly being employed to support parenting - from helping parents read to their children, to addressing problematic behaviors.? In a recent webinar, Busara and 联合国儿童基金会 presented two resources that embody this new strand of research.
The first resource, The Little Book for Parenting Programmes, is focused on process: it teaches practitioners and funders to identify and overcome behavioral obstacle in their programs.
The second resource, What Works to Reduce Violence against Children and Women in the Home in Low- and Middle-Income Countries, is evidence focused: it analyzes detailed findings from the research literature on behavioral interventions to decrease parental violence.???
Little Book for Parenting Programmes
The Little Book for Parenting Programme is a 43-page guide on how to use behavioral science to increase the uptake and usage of caregiver programs.? It introduces readers to foundational concepts in behavioral science and the type of non-obvious barriers that can stop a parent from engaging in an otherwise interesting and valuable program.?For example, everyone, especially parents, can suffer from the planning fallacy: underestimating the time, cost and complexity of engaging in a future parenting program.?This can cause parents to commit to a program, like reading-time at the library, and then not follow through.??
Building on these core lessons, the guide then shifts to the potential solutions and the process practitioners can use to determine which problems caregivers face, and which tool to employ to address those problems. The guide has step by step instructions in this process, with worksheets and reference tables.
The Little Book was developed by Busara and CUBIC, the behavioral science team at Save the Children International .
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What Works to Reduce Violence
In What Works to Reduce Violence against Children and Women in the Home in Low- and Middle-Income Countries, UNICEF focuses on a very specific parenting intervention: using behavioral insights to address parental violence against children and against mothers.?
The UNICEF team reviewed?28 different interventions conducted across low and middle income countries in the Global South, including Brazil, China, Iran, Nigeria, and South Africa.?They categorized the underlying theories used and the strength of the evidence; 86% of the studies, for example, employed randomized control trials.
The researchers find promising evidence that social and behavioral change parenting programs can be effective at reducing violence against children.?They also can decreased the co-occurrence of intimate partner violence.?
The results provide hope that children, and mothers, can be made safer in their homes. The guide was developed by UNICEF, and you can download a copy here.
About the webinar
For the webinar, we were joined by Malhar Acharya an Analyst at Busara, Floriza Freire Gennari, DrPH , Behavioral Science Specialist at UNICEF, Alessandra Guedes , Gender and Development Manager at UNICEF, and Sam Sternin , Behaviour Change Consultant at the Bernard van Leer Foundation. I served as the moderator.
In addition, during the session the speakers referenced a variety of other resources that might be of interest;
We hope you find these resources useful in your work.??