Integrating Dialectical Behavior Therapy Skills and Parent Training for Dually Dysregulated Parents and Children: An Idiographic Case Study

Despite high rates of co-occurrence of psychopathology among parents and children, few interventions simultaneously address clinically elevated symptoms in parent and child as well as parenting. Emotion dysregulation (ED) is a promising transdiagnostic target for such dual-generation interventions. Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) Skills target ED, and there is growing interest in integrating DBT Skills with Parent Training (PT) to improve the mental health of parents and children. In this case study, a 24-week DBT Skills + PT intervention for emotionally dysregulated parent-preschooler dyads was delivered to three parents. We evaluated the process of change in parental ED, parent-reported child ED, and parenting using idiographic statistical analyses of weekly repeated measures (26 timepoints). Feasibility and acceptability of the intervention were also assessed. Results from person-specific linear regression analyses showed large improvements over the course of treatment, and the temporal cascade of changes in parent ED, child ED and parenting varied, suggesting a different process of change for each parent. Feasibility and acceptability were high and parents’ feedback during exit interviews are used to extend the interpretation of the quantitative results. DBT Skills + PT may be a promising transdiagnostic approach to address the needs of parent-child dyads with ED.