CDC grant boosts UO program that addresses children's behaviors

Elizabeth A. Stormshak

A family intervention program that will see researchers from the University of Oregon's College of Education collaborating with mental health-care providers in Portland has won a three-year, $900,000 grant from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The grant, which became effective this month, allows researchers in the UO's Child and Family Center to test the effectiveness the Family Check-Up intervention, which is part of a multifaceted ecologically-based child and family intervention program known as EcoFIT. Family Check-Up aims to reduce child and adolescent behavioral problems by enhancing positive parenting and family management skills of caregivers.

"This intervention promotes healthy child development by enhancing effective parenting and reducing parenting strategies associated with violence and aggression," said psychologist Elizabeth A. Stormshak, a professor in the UO's Counseling Psychology Program and co-director of the Eugene and Portland-based Child and Family Center. "We have refined our intervention model by integrating findings from its developmental research and redesigning the model for community-based implementation."

Under the grant, 120 Portland-area families with children ages 10–15 will be randomly assigned to receive either the Family Check-Up intervention to be led by eight specially trained therapists or traditional treatment from participating mental health centers. Of particular interest, Stormshak said, is increasing the potential for therapists to focus on family-management skills known to increase successful child adjustment and to decrease the coercive family processes associated with child maltreatment. The program's effectiveness will be closely monitored and documented.

The Child and Family Center is an institute dedicated to understanding and promoting mental health and resilience within families in all cultural communities. Its members conduct research on social-emotional development from infancy through adolescence and provide innovative assessment, prevention, and intervention services for children and families. The center seeks to collaborate with local public schools, tribal, state, national, and international organizations and with researchers engaged in similar efforts to understand and promote mental health in children and families. The center also provides collaborative opportunities for affiliate researchers from across the United States, Canada, Italy, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

Stormshak, who received a doctorate in 1995 in child clinical psychology from Penn State University, has focused her research on understanding developmental factors associated with conduct problem behavior, including parenting and peer relations. She has been funded by the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Department of Education to conduct research in schools and Head Start Centers.

Source: Elizabeth Stormshak, co-director, UO Child and Family Center, 541-346-3538, bstorm@uoregon.edu