ParentText User Engagement and Effectiveness Study

Summary

The study has two main aims. The first aim is to optimise user engagement in ParentText. The goal is to identify the optimal delivery of ParentText for parents/caregivers from low- and middle-income countries, using a randomised between-subjects factorial experimental design.

The second aim is to examine the preliminary effectiveness of the chatbot adaption of the Parenting for Lifelong Health programme, ParentText, on the primary outcome of child maltreatment and secondary outcomes of positive parenting, parental self-efficacy, parental communication about sexual abuse, financial stress, parental stress, child behaviour problems, and intimate partner violence.

This study is part of a multi-phase research project. The full research project has been registered to the Open Science Framework platform.

To address the first aim, the investigators will be conducting a factorial experiment which will examine the impact of four components, Personalisation (High/Low), Gamification (On/Off), Gender Targeting (On/Off), Frequency of message (1 per day/ 3 per day) on participant engagement. The factorial experiment will be conducted in two countries, Malaysia and South Africa. Within each country, the investigators have local partners who will be involved in deploying the intervention and recruiting participants. Parents/caregivers will be primarily recruited through country-specific UNICEF U-Report platforms and government partners. RapidPro, the programme on which the chatbot is deployed, will randomly allocate participants to the 16 experimental conditions. The purpose of the factorial experiment is to estimate the main and interaction effects of the four components. Based on the results the investigators will optimise the delivery of ParentText by selecting components or components levels that promote the highest level of engagement based on effect size.

The second aim will be addressed by conducting latent growth curve models or multi-level models, to examine the changes in outcome variables over time. The experiment will be conducted across five countries, Malaysia, South Africa, the Philippines, Jamaica and Sri Lanka. Within each country, the investigators have local partners who will be involved in deploying the intervention and recruiting participants.

Conditions

• Engagement
• Positive Parenting
• Child Maltreatment
• Intimate Partner Violence

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

ParentText

ParentText delivers content, aligning with children's developmental stages (0-23 months, 2-9 years, 10-17 years). ParentText content is delivered through text messages, images, audio and video for parents/ caregivers and their children. Parents receive parenting content surrounding three themes: 1) relationship building by spending time together, 2) positive reinforcement, 3) stress reduction for parents and caregivers. Further supportive content is available for parents of children living with disabilities, child development, online child safety, talking about COVID-19 with children, family budgeting, family harmony, helping with schoolwork and sexual violence prevention.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• IDEMS International

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• UNICEF South Africa

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• UNICEF Malaysia

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• UNICEF Sri Lanka

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• UNICEF Jamaica

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• UNICEF Philippines

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Health Promotion Bureau, Sri Lanka

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Universiti Putra Malaysia

  collaborator OTHER

• Ateneo de Manila University

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Cape Town

  collaborator OTHER

• The LEGO Foundation

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• University of Oxford

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Rumaya Binti Juhari, Dr · Universiti Putra Malaysia

• Liane Peña Alampay, Dr · Ateneo de Manila University

• Rosanne Jocson, Dr · Ateneo de Manila University

• Hlengiwe Sacolo, Dr · University of Cape Town

• Frances Gardner, Dr · University of Oxford

• Joyce Wamoyi, Dr · Tanzania National Institute of Medical Research)

• Ytske Van Winden · UNICEF Jamaica

• David Stern, Dr · IDEMS International

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

PREVENTION

Masking

DOUBLE

Model

FACTORIAL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

99 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2022-06-01

Primary Completion

2022-12-01

Completion

2022-12-01

Countries

• Malaysia

Study Locations