Adults
Conditions
Brief summary
AVANCE-Houston seeks to understand whether a standard or compressed schedule format for delivering the Survival Skills for Healthy Families curriculum better meets the needs of low-income adults to improve skill retention and, ultimately, to promote better outcomes for healthy family relationships and economic stability.
Detailed description
AVANCE-Houston's FRAMEWorks (Family, Relationship, and Marriage Education Works) Project seeks to promote healthy family relationships and economic stability by providing the Survival Skills for Healthy Families (SSHF) curriculum to cohorts of low-income adults. Developed by Family Wellness Associates, SSHF is an evidence-based curriculum delivered through a series of workshops that focus on communication skills, conflict resolution, knowledge of the benefits of marriage, stress and anger management, parenting skills, financial literacy, job and career advancement, and relationship skills to improve family and economic stability. In the past, AVANCE has offered two curriculum delivery models: recurring weekly workshops (standard schedule format) and intensive weekend retreats (compressed schedule format). Each model meets the needs of the target population in different ways, and participants consider factors such as childcare, work/school schedules, weekend availability, and geographic location when choosing their preferred model. The key goal of this descriptive evaluation is to assess the extent that attitudes and behaviors related to parenting, partner relationships, and financial and job readiness change after participation in the SSHF curriculum. Though the program offers support services and economic stability resources, our analysis will only include outcome changes based on surveys taken at program enrollment, program completion, and one-year post-enrollment. Additionally, a secondary analysis will focus on the ancillary question of whether differences in outcomes exist between in-person and virtual format group participants, and subgroup analyses will be conducted.
Interventions
OTHERDescriptive Intervention
A trained facilitator, supported by Career and Family Coaches, leads every HMRE parenting workshop for adults via multiple delivery models: in recurring weekly workshops (2 hours each workshop for 7 weeks) and intensive weekend retreats (totaling 16 hours). Additionally, AVANCE offers the weekly workshops either virtually via Zoom or in-person. All workshop models were offered to program participants who were able to choose whether the weekly (either in-person or virtually) or the weekend (in-person only) format worked best for them. Curriculum content is consistent across all delivery methods and target hours for all participants is 14 hours.
Sponsors
Midwest Evaluation & Research
Avance Clinical Pty Ltd.
Study design
Allocation
NA
Intervention model
SINGLE_GROUP
Primary purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
NONE
Intervention model description
Participants choose between two workshop options: receive 14 hours of Survival Skills for Healthy Families curricula over 7 weeks. receive 14 hours of Survival Skills for Healthy Families in a compressed format during a 16-hour weekend retreat, followed by a 2-hour reflections workshop two weeks later. Participants (regardless of how they participate) also receive employment supports and case management services.
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
Yes
Inclusion criteria
* Adult (age 18 and older) * Reside in Harris County (Houston area), TX
Exclusion criteria
* Minor (under the age of 18) * Reside outside of Harris County (Houston area), TX
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Parenting Behavior Measurement #1 | Change from baseline in parenting behavior (frequency of support for child) at 12 months from enrollment. | How did parenting behavior outcomes change from program enrollment to 1 year after enrollment? Items measured include: Parenting behavior measured with: 4 items - frequency of support for child (4-point scale) Measured on the parenting behavior scale #1 as: 1 = Never, 2 = Hardly ever, 3 = Sometimes, 4 = Often The higher the rating, the better the score. The 4 items are measured as a construct. All items are added together and divided by 4 to create the construct score. The higher the score, the better the outcome. maximum score of 4.0, minimum score of 1.0 |
| Partner Relationship Behavior Measurement #1 | Change from baseline in partner relationship behavior (frequency of key relationship behaviors) at 12 months from enrollment. | How did partner relationship behavior outcomes change from program enrollment to 1 year after enrollment? Items measured include: Partner relationship behavior measured with: 3 items - frequency of key relationship behaviors (4-point scale) Measured on the partner relationship behavior scale #1 as: 1 = Never, 2 = Hardly ever, 3 = Sometimes, 4 = Often The 3 items are measured as a construct. All items are added together and divided by 3 to create the construct score. The higher the score, the better the outcome. maximum score of 4, minimum score of 1.0 |
| Financial Readiness Measurement #1 | Change from baseline in financial readiness (presence of savings and checking accounts) at 12 months from enrollment. | How did financial readiness behavior outcomes change from program enrollment to 1 year after enrollment? Items measured include: Financial readiness measured with: 2 items - presence of a savings account and checking account (dichotomous) 1 = Yes, 0 = No, so the higher the rating, the better the score. |
Secondary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Parenting Attitudes Measurement #1 | Change from baseline in parenting attitudes (frequency of supportive feelings toward child) immediately after program completion (7 weeks) | 4A) How did parenting attitude outcomes change from program enrollment to program completion? Items measured include: Parenting attitudes measured with: 4 items - frequency of supportive feelings toward child (5-point scale) Measured on the parenting attitudes scale #1 as: 1 = Never, 2 = Hardly ever, 3 = Sometimes, 4 = Often, 5=always The 4 items are measured as a construct. All items are added together and divided by 4 to create the construct score. The higher the score, the better the outcome. maximum score of 5.0, minimum score of 1.0 |
| Partner Relationship Attitudes Measurement #1 | Change from baseline in parenting attitudes (level of agreement with how supportive partner is) immediately after program completion (7 weeks). | 5\) How did partner relationship attitude outcomes change from program enrollment to program completion? Items measured include: Partner relationship attitudes measured with: 5 items - level of agreement with how supportive partner is (5-point scale) Measured on the partner relationship attitudes scale #1 as: 1 = Strongly agree, 2 = Agree, 3 = Disagree, 4 = Strongly disagree, 5 = Not applicable The lower the rating, the better the score. The 5 items are measured as a construct. All items are added together and divided by 5 to create the construct score. maximum score of 5.0, minimum score of 1.0 |
Countries
United States
Contacts
PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATORMatt D Shepherd, PhD
Midwest Evaluation & Research
Participant flow
Pre-assignment details
All types of workshop completions (virtually completing across 7 weeks, completing in person across 7 weeks, completing the weekend format in person, completing the weekend format virtually) were analyzed as one arm. Originally, the study was designed to be an RCT where researchers would look for differences among groups. But funding was downgraded to a descriptive study, mostly due to COVID highly affecting the program when it started out.
Baseline characteristics
| Characteristic | — |
|---|---|
| Age, Categorical <=18 years | 2 Participants |
| Age, Categorical >=65 years | 71 Participants |
| Age, Categorical Between 18 and 65 years | 1330 Participants |
| Age, Continuous | 40.72 years |
| Race (NIH/OMB) American Indian or Alaska Native | 28 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) Asian | 56 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) Black or African American | 365 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) More than one race | 252 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander | 0 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) Unknown or Not Reported | 0 Participants |
| Race (NIH/OMB) White | 702 Participants |
| Sex: Female, Male Female | 1052 Participants |
| Sex: Female, Male Male | 351 Participants |
Adverse events
| Event type | EG000 affected / at risk |
|---|---|
| deaths Total, all-cause mortality | 0 / 1,403 |
| other Total, other adverse events | 0 / 1,403 |
| serious Total, serious adverse events | 0 / 1,403 |
Outcome results
None listed