Parents of vulnerable children: review of interventions

Title: Evidence review: An analysis of the evidence for parenting interventions for parents of vulnerable children aged up to six years
Author: Parenting Research Centre
Commissioned by: New Zealand Government Families Commission
Published: 2013

The Parenting Research Centre was commissioned in 2012 by the New Zealand Government Social Policy Evaluation and Research Unit (then called the Families Commission) to conduct an evidence review of parenting interventions for parents of children aged up to six years who have been abused or neglected or who are at risk of abuse or neglect.

Using a rapid evidence assessment methodology, we employed stringent criteria to identify parenting interventions evaluated internationally that we could confidently call ‘effective’ for improving maltreatment and other outcomes for this population.

Of the 81 interventions identified, we drew the following conclusions:

• 12 interventions could more confidently be considered effective for improving outcomes
• interventions with the best evidence were: Nurse Family Partnership, Attachment and Biobehavioral Catch-up, Parent-Child Interaction Therapy, SafeCare and a version of Triple P.

To provide the Families Commission with information about the characteristics and practices the interventions shared, we conducted a common elements analysis. In this analysis we drew together the delivery and content details common among the more effective interventions.

Learn more

• Read the report (PDF, 1.16MB)
• Appendices 1 & 2 (PDF, 886KB)
• Appendix 3 (PDF, 720KB)
• Appendix 4 (PDF, 964KB)
• Appendix 5 (PDF, 1.19MB)
• Appendix 6 (PDF, 1.06MB)
• Appendix 7 (PDF, 747KB)
• Appendix 8 (PDF, 914KB)