51³Ô¹Ï

Topic

Parenting Under Stress: The Role of a Home-Based Intervention in Enhancing Efficacy and Reducing Stress in Families

Department of Psychology

Date & location

• Tuesday, May 27, 2025

• 11:00 A.M.

• Virtual Defence

Reviewers

Supervisory Committee

• Dr. Sarah Macoun, Department of Psychology, 51³Ô¹Ï (Supervisor)

• Dr. Catherine Costigan, Department of Psychology, UVic (Member)

• Dr. Gina Harrison, Department of Educational Psychology and Leadership Studies, UVic (Outside Member) 

External Examiner

• Dr. Heather Prime, Department of Psychology, York University 

Chair of Oral Examination

• Dr. Rana El-Sabaawi, Department of Biology, UVic

   

Abstract

Low socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with heightened stress, reduced access to resources, and diminished parenting efficacy, all of which can negatively impact child development. This study examines the effectiveness of a novel, parent-delivered intervention, Dino Island (DI), in enhancing parental efficacy and reducing parenting stress in families from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds. DI, which is a tablet-based attention and executive functioning (EF) training program, integrates process-specific and compensatory approaches to improve children's attention and EF skills. Additionally, it incorporates a parent training component to empower caregivers with strategies to support their children’s cognitive and behavioral development. Grounded in the Family Stress Model, this dissertation explores the intersection of SES, parenting efficacy, and child outcomes, with a focus on families facing socioeconomic adversity. A mixed-methods design was used to evaluate DI’s impact on parents’ level of stress, perceived efficacy, and parent-reported child cognitive outcomes (attention and EF). Pre- and post-intervention assessments measured changes in parental stress and parental efficacy and whether these changes were related to family SES levels as measured by family income. Additionally, this dissertation investigated whether parent-reported child outcomes changed after participating in DI, and whether these changes were related to family SES levels. Findings indicate that DI improved parents’ self-reported efficacy by providing structured strategies for addressing challenges, enhancing communication, and promoting positive parent-child interactions. Parents also reported reduced stress and a strengthened sense of empowerment in their caregiving role. Child specific outcomes also indicated some improvements across attention and some EF skills as reported by parents which indicates that DI intervention was effective for parents and children. These findings suggest that home-based cognitive interventions, when paired with parent training, can provide parents with tools that improve feelings of parenting efficacy and lowered stress which over time may be associated with better child cognitive, social, and emotional outcomes. Future research should explore the sustainability of these effects and the potential for scaling interventions like DI to benefit broader populations.