Evaluating the effectiveness of intensive family preservation services: A multi-level meta-analysis

IF 3.4 2区心理学 Q1 FAMILY STUDIES

Child Abuse & Neglect Pub Date : 2025-02-01 DOI:10.1016/j.chiabu.2024.107198

Lou Lippens , Lana De Clercq , Stijn Vandevelde , Sarah De Pauw , Geert-Jan Stams

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Background

Intensive Family Preservation Services (IFPS) are an important part of child welfare. They are short-term, in-home treatment programs aimed at preventing imminent out-of-home placements, however, today, their overall effectiveness remains unclear.

Objective

This study aims to conduct a comprehensive review of IFPS effectiveness, evaluate a wide range of outcomes, and analyze the impact of various factors on its success.

Methods

A three-level meta-analysis was conducted on 33 controlled trial studies comprising 226 effect sizes to test whether the effectiveness of IFPS was influenced by study, program, target, sample, and outcome characteristics.

Results

Analyses showed that IFPS did have a modest overall effect on treatment outcomes (g = 0.18), with notable variations across different outcome measures, showing small and positive effects on out-of-home placement (g = 0.31), family functioning (g = 0.19), juvenile delinquency (g = 0.19), and parental psychopathology (g = 0.34). Greater program intensity was associated with smaller effects, and follow-up assessment yielded larger effects than post-test assessments, indicating that positive intervention effects increased over time.

Conclusions

The findings suggest a rather limited effectiveness of IFPS, indicating that both practice and policy should take this into account. Recommendations for future research are provided to further enhance understanding and improvement of IFPS interventions.

查看原文本刊更多论文

评估强化家庭保护服务的有效性：多层次荟萃分析。

背景：强化家庭保护服务是儿童福利的重要组成部分。它们是短期的家庭治疗项目，旨在防止即将到来的家庭外安置，然而，今天，它们的总体效果尚不清楚。目的：本研究旨在对IFPS的有效性进行全面回顾，评估广泛的结果，并分析各种因素对其成功的影响。方法：对包含226个效应量的33项对照试验进行三水平荟萃分析，以检验IFPS的有效性是否受到研究、项目、目标、样本和结局特征的影响。结果：分析显示，IFPS确实对治疗结果有适度的总体影响（g = 0.18），不同结果测量值之间存在显著差异，对家庭外安置（g = 0.31）、家庭功能（g = 0.19）、青少年犯罪（g = 0.19）和父母精神病理（g = 0.34）显示出小而积极的影响。更大的计划强度与较小的影响相关，随访评估比测试后评估产生更大的影响，表明积极的干预效果随着时间的推移而增加。结论：研究结果表明IFPS的有效性相当有限，表明实践和政策都应考虑到这一点。为进一步增进对IFPS干预措施的理解和改进，对未来的研究提出了建议。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Child Abuse & Neglect Multiple-

CiteScore

7.40

自引率

10.40%

发文量

397

期刊介绍： Official Publication of the International Society for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect. Child Abuse & Neglect The International Journal, provides an international, multidisciplinary forum on all aspects of child abuse and neglect, with special emphasis on prevention and treatment; the scope extends further to all those aspects of life which either favor or hinder child development. While contributions will primarily be from the fields of psychology, psychiatry, social work, medicine, nursing, law enforcement, legislature, education, and anthropology, the Journal encourages the concerned lay individual and child-oriented advocate organizations to contribute.