Behavioral Activation Approach to Parent Training: Feasibility of Promoting Routines of Exploration and Play During Mealtime (Mealtime PREP)

Abstract

OBJECTIVE. Systematic approaches are needed to help parents with young children adopt healthy routines. This study examined the feasibility (home data collection, protocol adherence, intervention acceptance) of using a behavioral activation (BA) approach to train parents of children with sensory food aversions. METHOD. Parents of young children (18–36 mo) were trained using the novel Promoting Routines of Exploration and Play During Mealtime intervention. Measures included video-recorded meals, Fidelity Checklist, Treatment Acceptability Questionnaire, and Behavioral Pediatrics Feeding Assessment Scale. Descriptive statistics were used. RESULTS. Eleven children and their parents completed the study. Two of three feasibility benchmarks were met. Intervention acceptance was high (mean score = 43/48). On average, parents used three more intervention strategies after training than at baseline. CONCLUSION. Using a BA approach to parent training shows promise for altering daily mealtime routines. Delivering this intervention in the home is feasible and received acceptable ratings among this sample.

Examining child mealtime behavior as parents are coached to implement the Mealtime PREP intervention in the home: Findings from a pilot study

“…The results of these analyses signal that educating and empowering parents to integrate specific evidence-based strategies into their daily routines is a promising approach to managing child mealtime behavior. This also supports our preliminary findings that parent-mediated interventions show promise to enhance child mealtime routines in a natural setting every day (Caldwell et al., 2018b). Additional research is needed to determine the true interaction between parental strategy use and child behavior and the long-term health outcomes associated with coaching parents to implement strategies to promote food acceptance and appropriate mealtime behavior.…”

“…All clinicians completed a minimum of 8 hours training on the Mealtime PREP intervention prior to engaging participant families. For a full description of the intervention, please refer to the Mealtime PREP feasibility study (Caldwell et al., 2018b). In essence, parents were trained incrementally to lead enhanced daily child meals by incorporating nine evidence-based strategies (1. shared meals with at least one adult; 2.…”

Feasibility of OT-Parentship: An intervention for parents of adolescents with autism

“…We further validated the results of the fidelity checklist using video data collection. The last author analyzed 30% (similarly to Caldwell et al, 2018) of randomly selected (complete) sessions and marked whether each segment of the session took place according to the protocol by marking yes/no. Treatment fidelity scores for each family are expressed in percentage by calculating the sum of the segments completed (marked as “yes”) divided by the total possible number of segments × 100.…”