Caregiver-Child Interaction and Health Behaviors
Condition: Early Childhood Caries; Caregiver-Child Coercion
Study type: Interventional

Summary: 
      Caregivers and their child are being asked to participate because the investigators are
      interested in typical caregiver-child interactions and health behaviors. In particular, the
      investigators are interested in different ways that caregivers react to and understand their
      young children's behavior, and their health behaviors.
    

Detailed description: 
      If they decide to participate in this study, caregivers and their child will come visit the
      laboratory twice at times that are convenient for them. The first visit will take 2.5-3 hours
      and the second visit will take 2-2.5 hours, so the subject runners will ask them to schedule
      them at times when their child will be well-rested and fed prior to arrival.

      Here is a list of activities that the subject runners will ask caregivers and their child to
      participate in. These activities will be video-recorded and recordings will be kept digitally
      on a secure password-protected server. A separate consent form for the video-recording will
      be provided and caregivers must consent to the video-recording if they wish to participate in
      this study. Video-recordings will be assigned a random subject ID number.

        -  Upon arrival at the laboratory during both visits, the subject runners will explain the
           tasks to caregivers and the subject runners will set them and their child up with the
           machine that allows us to measure heart rate and skin moisture. This means the subject
           runners will place nine sensors on their and their child's bodies. These sensors will be
           placed on the collar bones, the lower left rib cage, the upper and mid-chest, the upper
           and midback, and the palm of their and their child's non-dominant hand. Caregivers and
           their child will still be able to move freely around the room.

        -  Next, the subject runners will either:

             -  Conduct a short discussion where the subject runners will discuss caregivers'
                responses to their child's behavior or the intentions behind their child's
                behavior. A quarter of the research subjects in this study will complete a task
                where their responses to their child's behaviors are discussed and another quarter
                of the subjects will complete a task where the reasons for their child's behavior
                are discussed. Which type of discussion participants have will be "randomly
                assigned", which means that a computer will generate this decision before they
                arrive for their visit.

             -  Or have caregivers complete a short computerized activity where caregivers will
                look at a series of images and descriptions or will be asked to rate a series of
                images with facial expressions. A quarter of the research subjects in this study
                will complete a computerized activity where they will look at a series of images
                and descriptions and another quarter of the subjects will complete a computerized
                activity where they will rate a series of images with facial expressions. Which
                type of activity participants have will be "randomly assigned", which means that a
                computer will generate this decision before they arrive for their visit.

        -  After this brief discussion, the subject runners will have caregivers and their child
           complete a series of tasks that are the sorts of activities they might encounter in
           daily life. In the first task the subject runners will have caregivers direct their
           child to clean up toys. In the second task the subject runners will have their child
           play with some toys while they are occupied on their phone. In the third task the
           subject runners will give them questionnaires to complete while their child waits on a
           mat. All three of these tasks will take 25-30 minutes.

        -  After this task, the subject runners will either:

             -  Allow caregivers to have a break with their child. The subject runners will provide
                toys, drinks and snacks during the break. The subject runners will then ask
                caregivers to brush their child's teeth with a toothbrush that the subject runners
                provide, as they normally would.

             -  Or have caregivers complete a task where they will rate what they felt and thought
                during their interaction with their child while watching a video of their
                interaction.

        -  At the end of these tasks the subject runners will provide caregivers with the
           opportunity to discuss the visit, their child's behaviors, and any other questions or
           concerns they may have. The subject runners will not ask them to participate in any
           additional visits or questionnaires after their second visit.
    

Intervention name(s): Behavioral Intervention; Cognitive Intervention; Interpretation Bias Intervention; Evaluative Conditioning
Intervention type(s): Behavioral; Other; Other; Other
Intervention description(s): The behavioral intervention has the parents develop an if-then plan for dealing with conflict and negativity, using strategies to downregulate their own negative emotions.; The cognitive intervention has parents come up with reasons why their children do things they don't like, until they come up with benign attributions for those behaviors.; The Interpretation Bias intervention has parents look at "morphed" facial expressions and determine whether the face is happy or angry. Positive feedback is given for rating the faces as happy and negative feedback is given for rating the faces as angry.; The Evaluative Conditioning intervention presents parents with pictures of ambiguous child faces (conditioned stimuli) and pairs them with positive word descriptors (unconditioned stimuli; e.g., sweet; cooperative).
Allocation: Randomized
Intervention model: Parallel Assignment
Intervention model description: Within-subject design over 2 visits
Masking: None (Open Label)
Primary purpose: Basic Science
Keywords: Caregiver-Child Coercion; Early Childhood Caries