Inadequate parenting is an important public health problem with possible severe and long-term consequences related to child development. We have solid theoretical and political arguments in favor of efforts enhancing the quality of the early family environment. However, little is known about effect of universal approaches to parenting support during the transition to parenthood. This project is a randomized trial of group based parenting support, the Family Startup Program (FSP), currently implemented large scale in Denmark. Participants are 1700 pregnant women and partners, the mother expecting first child. Families were randomized to one of two conditions a) participation in FSP or b) Treatment As Usual (TAU). FSP aims to prepare new families for their roles as parents and enhance parental access to informal sources of support, i.e. social network and community resources. TAU is the publicly available pre- and postnatal care available to families in both conditions. Data are obtained during pregnancy, when the child is nine months, 18 months, four and seven years. Analyses employ survey data, administrative data from health visitors, and administrative register based data from Statistics Denmark. The primary study outcome is measured by the Parenting Sense of Competence scale. Other outcomes include parenting and couple relationship quality, utility of primary sector service and child physical health, socio-emotional and cognitive development. Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT02294968.

Keywords: Parenting education, Primary prevention, Father-child relations, Early intervention, Child development, Perinatal care, Postnatal care, Community health services.

Head of project:

Marianne Simonsen (PI) & Tea Trillingsgaard

Other associates:

Hanne Nørr Fentz, Rikke Damkjær Maimburg, Anne Klode