Long. Designs: Interventions and RCTs Flashcards
What are the limitations of identifying causality with developmental research?
Duration of development/confounds; experience different environments which affect our outcomes
Control vs Validity; Can’t control what happens outside the lab
Negative outcomes? Not ethical
What can experimental longitudinal designs also be called?
Interventions over time
What are the goals for interventions
To identify methods to correct or prevent problems in a developmentally vulnerable population
Generate knowledge that can be applied broadly
What are the limitations of within-subject intervention designs?
Maturation
Testing effects
What design is Costello et al (2003) an example of?
Between subjects natural intervention
What was Costello et al (2003) initially investigating and what happened half way through the study?
Mental health outcomes in North Carolina
Casino was built in the native American reservation and proceeds get split amongst the residents of the conservation
What did Costello (2003) find from their study?
Before the Casino, there were high rates of behavioural problems (conduct and oppositional defiant)
After Casino, due to the change in poverty, there was a reduction in behavioural problems
Supports social causation
What are the limitations of the study?
Why did it only improve conduct and oppositional defiant behavioural problems?
Selection bias
What are the general limitations of between subject interventions?
Selection bias
Placebo Affect
Compensatory rivalry
How do we introduct randomness to overcome the limitations of between-subject interventions?
remove the pretest as it assumes all the participants are the same
What is the Bucharest Early Intervention Project?
1000s of children in Romania in 1988 were put into institutions due to increase in child abandonment due to demands from the governments for parents to produce more children but they couldn’t afford it
Wanted to see the effects of putting some children into an intervention e.g Foster care
Describe the procedure of Zeanah et al’s (2003) study with the BEIP
18-20 families
Visits to foster parents every 10-15 days
EEG measures
Observational procedures
RCT
Interviews - attachment
Tests for attention, visual impairment, lang etc
What were the results of Zeanah et al’s (2003) study?
Some developed quicker when in foster care
Many domains were found to have no benefit or slow effects
Romanian government implemented a foster care programme
What are some limitations of Zeanah et al’s (2003) study?
Self-selection bias of foster parents
Participant drop out - due to agreeing not to interfere they lost a lot of ptps due to being adopted or returning to bio patents
Ethics - those not allocated to foster care will be negatively impacted
What 5 things should you consider before deciding to intervene
Context sensitivity, ethics, intent-to-treat, design, control group
What should be considered for Context sensitivity?
Does it impose of subjective beliefs?
Is the intervention appropriate for the context?
Does the design of the intervention generalise to other contexts? - Nurse visits for low income parents in UK vs US
Selection bias of intervener
What should be considered for control group?
Paired assignment vs random
Placebo condition vs Alt intervention
Are the ptps aware of group membership = compensatory rivalry or resentful demoralisation
Is random assignment preserved?
What could affect intent-to-treat?
Unintended alterations to randomisation;
- access to alt intervention
- accidental or failure to administer intervention
- adherence to intervention
- Bleed effects
What ethical considerations should there be?
non-interference
participant compensation; coercion vs freedom to withdraw
What 5 things should be considered for the evaluations and production of an intervention?
Feasibility
Develop OR Identify Intervention
Implementation
Evaluation
What intervention was used in Hane et al’s (2015) study of quality of maternal caregiving in a neonatal intensive care unit?
Family Nurture Intervention
What was the goal of the Family Nurture Intervention in Hane et al’s (2015)
Improve the emotional connection between a mother and premature infants through focal soothing, skin and eye contact and value based sessions
What did the control group recieve instead of the FNI in Hane et al’s (2015) study?
Standard care
What was the goal of the Family Nurture Intervention in Hane et al’s (2015)
Improve the emotional connection between a mother and premature infants through focal soothing, skin and eye contact and value-based sessions
How did they operationalise quality of maternal care in Hane et al’s (2015) study?
a single session of coding behaviour of feeding and holding
What are the limitations of the study
Only one session of coding for feeding and holding - reliability?
Doesn’t go beyond discharge from hospital - does it work beyond this?
What did Humphrey’s et al (2015) analyse in the follow up study of the BEIP?
Psychopathology (and ADHD) at age 12
How did Humphrey’s et al (2015) measure psychopathology?
Diagnostic interview
What were the results from Humphrey et al’s (2015) study?
Institutionalised children had higher rates of ADHD and psychopathology
Stability of foster care also affected this
What are the limitations of the Humphrey et al’s (2015) study
Small sample due to being follow up and high drop out
Caregiver report of clinical interview
What intervention was used in Wimer et al’s (2011) study?
Room to Grow
How was involved in the Room the Grow intervention in Wimer et al’s (2011) study?
Given books, toys, community support, regular contact with social work and therapy
What are the limitations of Wimer et al’s (2011) study
Follow up only taken from 1 time point
Ethics - stop being given support which is of high value
doesn’t look at effects of baseline socio-economic status
