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Motivational interviewing (MI) shows promise for pediatric obesity prevention, but few studies address parental perceptions of MI. The aim of this study was to identify correlates of parental perceptions of helpfulness of and satisfaction with a MI-based pediatric obesity prevention intervention. We studied 253 children 2 to 6 years of age in the intervention arm of High Five for Kids, a primary care–based randomized controlled trial. In multivariable models, parents born outside the United States (odds ratio [OR] = 8.81; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 2.44, 31.8), with lower household income (OR = 3.60; 95% CI = 1.03, 12.55), and with higher BMI (OR = 2.86; 95% CI = 1.07, 7.65) were more likely to perceive MI-based visits as helpful in improving children’s obesity-related behaviors after the first year of the intervention. Parents of female (vs male), black (vs white), and Latino (vs white) children had lower intervention satisfaction. Our findings underscore the importance of tailoring pediatric obesity prevention efforts to target populations.

Objective. This study aimed to identify socioeconomic correlates of computer/Internet use among parents of overweight preschool-aged children. Methods. A total of 470 baseline participants in a trial to prevent obesity in children 2 to 6.9 years old with body mass index ≥95th percentile or 85th to 95th percentile with one overweight parent were studied. Interviews with parents used Health Information National Trends Survey questions. Results/conclusions. Overall, 94% of the participants had home computers and 93% reported Internet usage. In adjusted models, parents with ≤college degree (odds ratio = 4.8; 95% confidence interval = 1.2-18.3) or with household income ≤$50 000 (odds ratio = 7.6; 95% confidence interval = 2.2-26.8) had decreased likelihood of computer ownership. Of parents who reported going online, 63% used Internet to look for health/medical information for themselves and 42% for their children. Parents with ≤a college degree or with body mass index 2were less likely to use Internet. Results support using the Internet for early childhood obesity prevention with enhanced outreach efforts for low socioeconomic status families.

Purpose. To study informal skill transfer via staff networks as a complement to formal training among afterschool childcare providers implementing a health promotion program. Design. Cross-sectional, sociometric network analysis. Setting. Boston Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) afterschool programs implementing the iPLAY program. Participants. All 91 staff members at 20 sites were eligible; 80 completed the survey (88% response rate). Measures. At the network level, network density measured system-level connectedness. At the staff level, the independent variable was out degree, the number of individuals to whom respondents noted a program-related connection. The dependent variable was skill gains, the number of key implementation skills gained from the network. Analysis. We mapped the staff program-related social network. We utilized multiple linear regression to estimate the relationship between out degree and skill gains, and we adjusted for clustering of staff in sites. Results. Most staff (77%) reported gaining at least one skill from the network, but only 2% of potential network connections were established. The regression model showed that out degree (i.e., number of program-related contacts) was significantly associated with skill gains (β = .48, p < .01) independent of other variables. Conclusion. Informal skill transfer in staff networks may be a useful complement to formal training for implementation of health promotion programs, but informal skill transfer was likely underutilized in this network. Future research employing longitudinal and/or multisite data should examine these findings in greater detail.

The number of days absent from school during the 1979-80 school year for 573 children aged 6-17 years in Berkshire County, Massachusetts was ascertained by parent reporting in a random household survey. Children with a wide range of chronic health impairments were reported as missing more school than their healthy peers (8.7 days vs. 5.8, p < .001). Although there was a trend for children reported as having functional impairments to miss more school than those with chronic conditions without functional impairments (11.0 vs. 8.1), the difference was not statistically significant. Children with a variety of reported psychosocial difficulties missed more school than those without psychosocial difficulties for the sample as a whole and for those with reported chronic conditions. These findings document support for the assumption that children with a wide range of physical and psychological problems miss more school than their healthy peers and illustrate that the etiology of school absences is multifactoral and reflects behavioral as well as purely physical phenomena.

services. Utilizing a prospective diary method with a random sample of 96 female users of a neighborhood health center, bivariate analysis indicate that the presence of stress on a given day is associated with an approximate doubling of the probability of a health care contact on that day. When controls are introduced into these analyses for a variety of background characteristics of these families, the daily stresslutilization relationship persists, independently of reported symptoms. In addition, a measure of stressful life events reported prior to the diary period also predicts utilization independently of both the daily stresses and reported symptoms; the stressful life-events variable in fact is one of the best single predictors of utilization. The diary data are also aggregated to approximate a retrospective research design, and substantial