1-073 - Head Start’s Direct Impacts on Parenting and Indirect Impacts on Children

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Head Start was founded as a two-generation program that serves both children and their parents, yet impacts of the program on parenting have rarely been studied. The four papers in this symposium use data from experimental evaluations to determine whether Head Start (HS) or Early Head Start (EHS) has positive direct impacts on parenting behavior, and indirect impacts on children’s school readiness. Paper 1 examines whether the extent of the impact of HS on parenting behavior depends on parents’ initial levels of skills in the Head Start Impact Study (HSIS) and finds that the experimental impact of HS on parent depressive symptoms was largest for parents with the most initial symptoms, while the impact on spanking was largest for parents who spanked the most at baseline. Paper 2 employs instrumental variables analyses to isolate the indirect impact of EHS on quality of parenting as mediated through the services and supports parents received through EHS. Paper 3 identifies the impacts of HS on parents’ pre-academic stimulation of their children in the HSIS and estimates average causal mediational effects for language, literacy and math outcomes. Paper 4 uses the HSIS and cross-lagged models to identify significant indirect impacts of HS on improvements in children’s externalizing behaviors through reductions in parents’ spanking, and improvements in children’s spelling skills through increases in parents’ reading to children. These papers illustrate that the federal Head Start program does live up to its two generation goal by having positive impacts on parents and parent-mediated impacts on children.

Sub Unit

• School Readiness/Childcare

Chair

• Elizabeth T. Gershoff, University of Texas at Austin

Individual Presentations

• Head Start Effects for Parents: Who Stands to Benefit the Most? - Presenting Author: Arya Ansari, University of Texas at Austin; Kelly M Purtell, Ohio State University; Elizabeth T. Gershoff, University of Texas at Austin

• Two-Generation Programs and Parenting Practices: The Effect of Services and Supports on Parenting and The Home Environment - Presenting Author: Anamarie Auger, University of California, Irvine

• A Contributing Role of Parents’ Preacademic Stimulation to Head Start Impacts on Children’s Language, Literacy, and Mathematics - Presenting Author: Soojin S Oh, Harvard Graduate School of Education; Hirokazu Yoshikawa, New York University

• Head Start Improves Child Behavior and Vocabulary by Decreasing Parent’s Spanking and Increasing Parents’ Reading to Children - Presenting Author: Elizabeth T. Gershoff, University of Texas at Austin; Arya Ansari, University of Texas at Austin; Kelly M Purtell, Ohio State University