Parenting Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: An RCT of an Online Course with Families of Children with CP
Abstract
Aim To test an online course Parenting Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (PACT) in an RCT with families of children with cerebral palsy (CP), predicting improvements in emotional availability and parent and child adjustment.Method 67 families of children (2-10 years) with CP participated. Families were randomly assigned to waitlist control or PACT. Assessments at baseline, post-intervention and at six-month follow up (durability of intervention effects) focussed on emotional availability, adjustment and quality of life. Analysis consisted of repeated measure linear regression models.Results At postintervention (T2), an intervention effect was demonstrated for two aspects of observed emotional availability: parental non-intrusiveness MD = 0.68 (-0.56 to 1.92), p = 0.050 and child involvement, MD = 0.91 (-0.36 to 2.18), p = 0.011. An intervention effect was also found for the parent-reported emotional availability in terms of child involvement. Further intervention effects were found in parent-report measures of child quality of life (social wellbeing and acceptance, participation and physical health), parental mindfulness, parental acceptance, support, social connection, and meaning. No effects were found on parent or child adjustment. Analyses focussed on durability of intervention effect, collapsed across groups, indicated that effects persisted at 6 month follow up (T4).Interpretation PACT demonstrated an intervention effect for two aspects of emotional availability-parental non-intrusiveness and child involvement-as well as parental mindfulness and child quality of life. Parents reported increased comfort with the CP diagnosis, higher likelihood to seek support, higher likelihood to stay connected to others and greater meaningful living. PACT is an effective online/telehealth parenting support intervention for parents of children with CP.
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Of the seven active intervention studies, all used randomization for allocation to groups.
“Of the seven active intervention studies, all used randomization for allocation to groups [41,42,43,45,46,47,48].”
From The Mental Health of Children with Cerebral Palsy: A Review of the Last Five Years of Research (2025) · cites this paper as [48]
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- Authors
- Whittingham, K., Sheffield, J., Mak, C., Wright, A., & Boyd, R. N.
- Affiliations
- The University of Queensland (AU)
- Corresponding author
- Whittingham, Koa
- Venue
- Behaviour Research and Therapy
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2022-08
- Volume
- 155
- Pages
- 104129
- ISSN
- 0005-7967 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W4281555025
- Cited by
- 37
- References
- 29
- Citations by year
- 2026: 4 · 2025: 14 · 2024: 8 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 1
- FWCI
- 7.52
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- Locations
- Behaviour Research and Therapy (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Health and Medical Research Council (631712, RB 1037220)
- Cerebral Palsy Alliance (PG0214)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Mindfulness and Compassion Interventions
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Family and Disability Support Research
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Psychiatry and Mental health › Cerebral Palsy and Movement Disorders
- Keywords
- cerebral palsy, children with disabilities, parental emotional availability, child involvement, parental acceptance, children's quality of life, parental adjustment, telemedicine, family support
- MeSH terms
- Cerebral Palsy, Child, Humans, Parent-Child Relations, Parents, Quality of Life, Parenting, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
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