Home Visitor-Child Communication: Influences on Parent-Child Interactions

• In Event: Parenting Programs for Young Children Around the Globe: Advances in Modalities, Culturally Sensitive Content, and Effects

Abstract

Communication skills are an important component of relationship-based service delivery, such as in early childhood home visiting. Most research focuses solely on home visitor-caregiver interactions; children who are active participants in home visiting services are ignored in the literature. Little is known about how home visitors communicate with young children during visits and what effect these exchanges have on parent-child interactions and family engagement in visits. The current project examines this issue using video recordings of home visits from 100 home visitor-family dyads representing multiple home visiting models.
Method. Parent Child Interaction and Parent Engagement were measured using the Home Visit Rating Scales Adapted (HVORS A+, Roggman, et al., 2008). Home Visit Communication and Content was measured using an adapted version of the Home Visit Observation Form (HVOF, Mc Bride & Peterson, 1991), developed in coordination with one of the measure’s authors. The HVOF measures the content and purpose of interactions between the home visitor and the caregiver. For this study, two additional scales were created to capture interactions between the home visitor-child dyad and the caregiver-child dyad.
Procedure Fifty home visitors from local programs throughout the U.S were recruited and asked to video-record two home visits each with of two of the families on their caseload. Home visitors and caregivers also competed post-visit surveys measuring caregiver engagement and helping relationship quality.
Results. Parent Engagement. After controlling for the nesting of home visitors and families within visits using multilevel modeling, home visitor-child communication predicted the home visitor’s post-visit rating of caregiver engagement (F(8,181)=5.762, p=.000, R2 = .20, R2 adjusted= .17). Passive modeling ( =-.192, t(-2.595, p=.000) and active modeling ( =-.441, t=-5.84, p=.000) strategies were both negatively associated with parent engagement, while coaching of parent-child interactions ( =.192, t=2.360, p=.019) was positively associated with engagement.
A similar pattern emerged for observer rated caregiver engagement from the HOVRS A+ (F(8,181)=3.457, p=.001, R2 = .129, R2 adjusted = .092). Active modeling (= -.239, t=-3.11, p=.002) was negatively related to family engagement, while coaching of parent child interactions ( =.167, t=2.006,p=.046) was positively associated with parent engagement.
Parent-Child Interaction. After controlling for the nesting of home visitor and family identity, home visitor-child communication also predicted the quality of parent-child interaction as measured by the HOVRS Parent-Child Interaction subscale ((F(8,172)=4.671, p=.000, R2 = .178,R2 adjusted= .140). Active modeling ( = -.318, t=-4.107, p=.000) by home visitors was negatively associated with the quality of parent child interactions while home visitor coaching of parent-child interactions ( =.231, t=2.75, p=.007) was positively associated with interaction quality.
Discussion. Home visitor-child interactions influence both caregiver engagement and observed quality of caregiver-child interactions during visits. Coaching may be a more effective than modeling in enhancing caregiver engagement and caregiver-child interactions. Results suggest the importance of child level interactions within home visits and the need to continue to address this topic in future work.

Authors

• Mary Kienstra Frese, Erikson Institute
  Presenting Author

• Jon Korfmacher, Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author