U.S. Department of Justice Office of Justice Programs, Innovation - Partnerships – Safer Neighborhoods Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) Serving Children, Families and Communities OJJDP Deinstitutionalization of Status Offenders

The Incredible Years

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Intervention:
The Incredible Years aims to reduce challenging behaviors in children and increase their social and self-control skills. The program involves teachers, parents, and their children who are at high risk or diagnosed with Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD), Conduct Disorder, and Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD).

The Incredible Years series features three multifaceted and developmentally-based curricula for parents, teachers, and children. The series is based on the following:
  • Cognitive social learning theory, and in particular Patterson’s coercion hypothesis of negative reinforcement developing and maintaining deviant behavior. The social learning model emphasizes the importance of the family as well as teacher socialization processes, especially those affecting young children. If parents and teachers can learn to deal effectively with children’s misbehavior and to model positive and appropriate problem-solving and discipline strategies, children can develop social competence, emotional regulation, and enhanced school readiness skills; they also can reduce aggressive behavior at home and at school.
  • Bandura’s modeling and self-efficacy theories, which have illustrated the power of modeling for children’s learning. All the programs make extensive use of DVDs to demonstrate appropriate interactions and behaviors, and use these to set up practice activities.
  • Piaget’s developmental cognitive learning stages and interactive learning methods, which emphasize the importance of children’s cognitive brain readiness to learn particular behaviors.
  • Cognitive strategies for managing anger and depression.
  • Attachment and relationship theories.
The parent training series targets high-risk parents and children as well as those children displaying behavior problems. Program protocols include prevention and treatment versions of intervention with dosage adjusted according to family and child risk factors. There are three separate Basic programs for parents of toddlers (1–3 years), preschoolers (3–5 years), and school-age children (6–12 years) focused on developmentally appropriate parenting strategies known to promote children’s social and academic competence and emotional regulation and also to reduce behavior problems. Core topic areas include parents learning effective play interaction skills and ways to strengthen their relationship with children; academic, persistence, social, and emotion coaching skills; using praise and incentives effectively; setting up predictable routines and schedules; providing adequate monitoring and safety-proofing children’s homes; using limit-setting and proactive discipline strategies effectively to handle misbehavior; and teaching children to solve problems. The Advanced program emphasizes parent interpersonal skills such as effective communication skills, anger management, solving problems between adults, ways to give and get support, and family meetings. This is offered to groups of parents who have completed the Basic program. The Supporting Your Child’s Education program emphasizes parenting approaches designed to promote parental involvement in setting up predictable homework routines and children’s academic skills such as reading and building collaborative relationships with teachers. This program is implemented after the completion of the Basic programs because it builds on the behavioral principles regarding social skills that were introduced in Basic and applies them to academic skills.

The teacher training series consists of 6 full-day, comprehensive, group discussion workshops spread out over the year for teachers, school counselors, and psychologists who work with children ages 3 to 10. Each program concentrates on strengthening teacher classroom management strategies, promoting children’s prosocial behavior, self-regulation and problem-solving skills, school readiness (reading skills), and reducing classroom aggression and noncooperation with peers and teachers. The teaching concepts are illustrated with brief videotaped vignettes of teachers interacting with children in classrooms. Group leaders use the videotaped scenes (of teachers handling problem situations effectively and ineffectively) to facilitate discussion, solve problems, and share ideas among teachers. Group leaders also help teachers discuss important principles and practice new skills through role-playing and homework assignments. Every session works on developing behavior plans for students, building support networks, and discussing ways to partner with parents to achieve goals for students.

The child training series, the Dina Dinosaur Social Skills, Emotion, and Problem-Solving Curriculum, emphasizes training children in skills such as emotional literacy, empathy (or perspective taking), friendship, anger management, interpersonal problem solving, school rules, and how to succeed at school. The series materials consist of a group leader’s manuals, DVDs, children’s and parents’ handouts, children’s books, detective home activities manuals, games, and activities. There is a small group treatment version of the program offered to five or six children at a time who may be pulled out twice weekly for 1- to 2-hour sessions in schools or in mental health centers. There is a prevention curriculum offered by teachers two to three times a week to all children in the classroom, providing small-group circle time lessons paired with small-group practice activities.

Evaluation Methodology:
Study 1
Webster–Stratton, Reid, and Hammond (2004) used an experimental design with random assignment to evaluate the Incredible Years program for children with oppositional defiant disorder (ODD). Participants were recruited from families with ODD requesting treatment at a university clinic. Only families with children ages 4 to 8 were included. Families entered the study in three cohorts of 50 to 55 families per cohort in 1995, 1996, and 1997. Random assignment to one of six groups was conducted by lottery after completion of baseline assessments in November of each year. The six groups were parent training only (n= 31); parent training plus teacher training (n= 24); child training only (n= 30); child plus teacher training (n= 23); parent plus child plus teacher training (n= 25); and waitlist control (n= 26).

The child training intervention included attendance at the clinic’s Dinosaur School in groups of five to six children for 2-hour weekly sessions over 18 to 20 weeks. The parent training included a 2-hour weekly meeting of 10 to 12 parents for 2-hour weekly sessions over 22 to 24 weeks. Teacher training included 4 full days of group training sequenced throughout the year concentrated on management strategies for handling misbehavior and for promoting positive relationships with difficult students. Additionally, teachers received regular phones calls and individual behavior planning meetings from child group leaders to coordinate the goals for children and to enhance methods used across settings.

Ninety percent of participants were boys, with a mean age of 71 months, and 79 percent were white. The mean number of behavioral problems according to the mothers’ reports was 21. Twenty-five percent of the families were single-mother families in which there was little or no contact with the father.

Data was collected from parents, teachers, and independent observers. Parent measures included the Parenting Practices Interview, the Daily Discipline Inventory, and the Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory. Observers in the home used the Dyadic Parent–Child Interaction System—Revised, the Coder Impression Inventory.

Three main measures were used to gather information on school behaviors. They were the Multiple Option Observation System for Experimental Studies to measure the frequency of child negative behaviors with peers; the Social Health Profile to measure poor authority acceptance; and the Classroom Atmosphere measure to rate general classroom atmosphere, disruptive behavior, and teacher responsiveness to students. The Dyadic Peer Interaction Scale was also used to rate the quality of the child’s play in a laboratory setting during a task with a playmate.

Teachers completed the Teacher Assessment of School Behavior and the Teacher Rating Scale of Perceived Competency in Young Children. At postintervention and follow-up, teachers and parents completed a brief inventory rating the effectiveness of the leader, the group dynamics, and the videotape vignettes.

Study 2
Miller Brotman and colleagues (2005) used an experimental design with random assignment of preschoolers at risk for antisocial behavior to two groups to evaluate The Incredible Years program. Families identified from family court records of youths adjudicated in Manhattan and the Bronx were eligible to participate if there was a preschool sibling of the adjudicated youth who was biologically related to or lived with the adjudicated youth for at least 1 year and whose caregiver also raised the adjudicated youth.

Court records of 6,909 youths were reviewed, and 1,228 families were identified with a preschooler in the home. After screening and contacts, 92 families completed assessments and were randomly assigned to the treatment group (47 families with 50 preschoolers) or the control group (45 families with 49 preschoolers). The prevention program followed The Incredible Years protocol, which included weekly 2-hour sessions for parents and preschoolers, biweekly home visits, and up to six additional family visits over a 6- to 8-month period. Groups for preschoolers incorporated elements from The Incredible Years Dinosaur Social Skills and Problem-Solving Curriculum. Leaders taught social skills, reinforced positive behavior, and provided consequences for negative behaviors. Home visits were designed to help parents implement skills at home. Nine female psychologists or doctoral candidates conducted seven parenting groups over a 5-year period.

The preschoolers’ average age was 3.9 years; 53 percent were girls; nearly half the parents had not completed high school; 61 percent were African American, 24 percent Hispanic, and 15 percent other ethnicities. Parents’ mean age was 36.3 years. At baseline, the groups differed on two variables: greater use of negative controls by intervention parents (assessed through observation) and greater use of praise by intervention parents (assessed through self-report). These differences were accounted for in the repeated-measures design.

Measures were
  • The Parenting Practices Interview (PPI)
  • Observation measures, the Dyadic Parent–Child Interaction Coding System—Revised (DPCIC—R), and the Global Impressions of Parent–Child Interaction (GIPCI), rated by two coders
  • Two composite scales of negative parenting using two PPI “harsh” subscales and the critical statements and harsh subscales from the (DPCIC—R)
  • A composite scale of Observer Positive Parenting, including individual items taken from the PPI, DPCIC—R, and GIPCI
  • Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment—Early Childhood version (which was used to assess stimulation for learning)
  • An Engaged Scale taken from three items on the Observed Peer Play in Unfamiliar Settings (OPPUS)
  • A Disruptive scale consisting of a single item from the OPPUS
Study 3
Webster–Stratton, Reid, and Stoolmiller (2008) evaluated The Incredible Years using a quasi-experimental design with random assignment of schools and student-level analyses. The study included children from160 Head Start classrooms from the Seattle, Wash., area Head Start and 14 elementary schools recruited into four cohorts over 4 years. Schools were matched on variables such as size, geographic location, and child demographics, and then matched pairs were randomly assigned to intervention or control conditions.

The sample consisted of 1,746 students nested in 160 classrooms, which, in turn, were nested under 119 teachers (40 teachers had 2 or more classrooms). Students at schools who served as controls in 1 year received the intervention the following year. Intervention and control elementary schools were comparable on key school and student variables such as percentage receiving free school lunches and achievement levels. The average age of students was 63.7 months; 50 percent were male; 27 percent were white, 20 percent were Asian, 18 percent were Latino, and 18 percent were African America; 31 percent did not speak English as their first language. A subsample (216) of moderate- to high-risk children were selected for more intensive assessment.

Pretests were conducted in early fall, and the intervention ran from November to April. Posttests were conducted in late spring. Measures used were Multiple Option Observation System for Experimental Studies to code classroom interactions. Teacher scales rated positive reinforcement, critical statements, and interaction with students. Child scales rated conduct problems, percentage of time disengaged, percentage of time spent in solitary play, positive child interactions with teacher and peers, and percentage of time spent in peer involvement. Teacher Coder Impressions Inventory evaluated classroom management style into five summary scores (harsh/critical, inconsistent/permissive, warm/affectionate, social emotional teaching, and effective discipline). Coder Observation of Classroom Adaptation—Revised rated school readiness and conduct problems, and Classroom Atmosphere Measure assessed the classroom environment. The Teacher–Parent involvement questionnaire (a 20-item teacher questionnaire rating parent involvement) and the Wally Problem Solving and Feeling Test were used to assess the subsample of high-risk children.

Evaluation Outcome:
Study 1
Negative and Positive Parenting
At immediate posttest, the study found that mother’s negative parenting was decreased significantly, compared with controls for all five experimental groups. At immediate posttest, mothers’ positive parenting and fathers’ negative parenting were significantly changed in the expected direction in all but two (child training only [or CT] and child training plus teacher training [or CT+TT]) of the experimental groups. The significant results were maintained at the 1-year follow-up.

Child Conduct Problems at Home
At immediate posttest, all five treatment conditions, compared with the control condition, showed significant improvement in negative behaviors with mothers, while only the three groups with parent training (parent training only [or PT], parent training plus teacher training [or PT+TT], and parent training plus child training plus child training or [PT+TT+CT]) showed improvement in negative behaviors with fathers. These results were maintained at the 1-year follow-up.

Child Behavior at School and Social Competence With Peers
At immediate posttest, all five treatment conditions, compared with the control condition, showed significant improvement in behavior at school. The Teacher Assessment of School Behavior scores indicated significant clinical improvements relative to controls. Similar results were found for classroom observation of children’s negative behavior. At the 1-year posttest, all but one of these improvements were maintained—the school behavior of children in the PT+TT+CT group deteriorated from posttest to the follow-up.

Child Social Competence
Significant improvements in social competence with peers were found in two (CT and PT+TT+CT) groups, compared with the control group, with a trend to a significant improvement in social competence in the CT+TT group.

Teacher Classroom Management
At the immediate posttest, the three teacher training conditions and the child-only training showed significant treatment effects compared with controls. Only the PT group failed to show significant effects.

Clinical Improvements in Conduct
At immediate posttest, 84.6 percent of the children in the PT+TT condition improved on the Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory (ECBI) intensity score completed by the mothers, compared with 40 percent of controls. In the CT+TT condition, 81.3 percent of children improved on this measure. On the Dyadic Parent Child Interaction System—Revised (DPICS—R) measure of child negative behavior, three treatment conditions showed clinically significant improvements: PT+TT (72 percent), PT+TT (85 percent), and CT (82 percent). At 1-year follow-up, ECBI scores indicated maintenance of improvements for the PT+TT condition, and DPICS—R scores increased for all groups that included child training. Classroom observation indicated that clinically significant aggressive behavior continued to improve from posttest to 1 year in all five treatment conditions, although ratings by the new teacher showed slight decreases except for the CT group.

Study 2
Parenting Practices
The second study reported that negative parenting practices decreased in the intervention group, compared with the control group based on both parent ratings and observer ratings. No differences in positive parenting practices were found between treatment and control parents.

Stimulation for Learning and Child Social Competence
Stimulation for learning amd engaging behavior improved significantly in the treatment families but deteriorated in the control families.

Study 3
Improvement in Teaching Style
The third study reported that the Teacher Coder Impressions measure found that intervention teachers were significantly less critical, less inconsistent/permissive, and warmer and more affectionate and placed more emphasis on social emotional teaching than control teachers at posttest. Head Start teachers in the intervention group improved significantly in effective discipline compared with those in the control group. On the Multiple Option Observation System for Experimental Studies measure, intervention teachers were significantly less critical than control teachers at posttest. Also, the more critical the teacher at baseline, the greater the improvement.

School Readiness
There was a significantly greater improvement in school readiness measured by the Coder Observation of Classroom Adaptation—Revised in the intervention group, compared with the control group. Also, individual differences were significant at the teacher level, and children with the poorest readiness scores at baseline improved the most.

Conduct Problems
There was no main effect for conduct problems as measured by the Multiple Option Observation System for Experimental Studies scales. However, intervention children with higher levels of conduct problems at baseline improved significantly at posttest relative to their counterparts in the control group.

Parent Involvement
Intervention parents were rated as marginally more involved in school activities than control parents.

Classroom Atmosphere
There was a large improvement in classroom atmosphere in the intervention group relative to the control group.

Child Problem Solving
High-risk children in the intervention group showed significantly greater improvement in problem solving than those in the control group.

References:
Miller Brotman, Laurie, Kathleen Kiely Gouley, Daniel Chesir–Teran, Tracy A. Dennis, Rachel G. Klein, and Patrick Shrout. 2005. “Prevention for Preschoolers at High Risk for Conduct Problems: Immediate Outcomes on Parenting Practices and Child Social Competence.” Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 34:724–34.

Reid, M. Jamila, Carolyn H. Webster–Stratton, and Theodore P. Beauchaine. 2001. “Parent Training in Head Start: A Comparison of Program Response Among African American, Asian American, Caucasian, and Hispanic Mothers.” Prevention Science 2(4):209–27.

Reid, M. Jamila, Carolyn H. Webster–Stratton, and Mary A. Hammond. 2007. “Enhancing a Classroom Social Competence and Problem-Solving Curriculum by Offering Parent Training to Families of Moderate- to High-Risk Elementary School Children.” Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology 36(5):605–20.

Webster–Stratton, Carolyn H. 1981. “Modification of Mothers’ Behaviors and Attitudes Through Videotape Modeling Group Discussion Program.” Behavior Therapy 12:634–42.

———. 1982a. “The Long-Term Effects of a Videotape Modeling Parent Training Program: Comparison of Immediate and 1 Year Follow-Up Results.” Behavior Therapy 13:702–14.

———. 1982b. “Teaching Mothers Through Videotape Modeling to Change Their Children’s Behaviors.” Journal of Pediatric Psychology 7(3):279–94.

———. 1984. “A Randomized Trial of Two Parent Training Programs for Families With Conduct-Disordered Children.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 52(4):666–78.

———. 1985. “Predictors of Treatment Outcome in Parent Training for Conduct-Disordered Children.” Behavior Therapy 16:223–43.

———. 1989. “Systematic Comparison of Consumer Satisfaction of Three Cost-Effective Parent Training Programs for Conduct-Problem Children.” Behavior Therapy 20:103–15.

———. 1990a. “Enhancing the Effectiveness of Self-Administered Videotape Parent Training for Families With Conduct Problem Children.” Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology 18(5):479–92.

———. 1990b. “Long-Term Follow-Up of Families With Young Conduct-Problem Children: From Preschool to Grade School.” Journal of Clinical Child Psychology 19(2):144–49.

———. 1991. “Annotation: Strategies for Working With Families of Conduct-Disordered Children.” British Journal of Child Psychiatry and Psychology 32(7):1047–62.

———. 1992. The Incredible Years: A Trouble-Shooting Guide for Parents of Children Ages 3–8 Years. Toronto, Ontario: Umbrella Press.

———. 1994. “Advancing Videotape Parent Training: A Comparison Study.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 62(3):583–93.

———. 1997. “Early Intervention for Families of Preschool Children With Conduct Problems.” In Michael J. Guralnick (ed.). The Effectiveness of Early Intervention: Second Generation Research. Baltimore, Md.: Paul H. Brookes Company, 429–54.

———. 1998. “Preventing Conduct Problems in Head Start Children: Strengthening Parent Competencies.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 66:715–30.

———. 2000. “The Incredible Years Training Series.” Juvenile Justice Bulletin. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.

Webster–Stratton, Carolyn H., and Mary A. Hammond. 1990. “Predictors of Treatment Outcome in Parent Training for Families With Conduct-Problem Children.” Behavior Therapy 21:319–37.

———. 1997. “Treating Children With Early-Onset Conduct Problems: A Comparison of Child and Parent Training Interventions.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 65(1):93–109.

Webster–Stratton, Carolyn H. and Martin Herbert. 1994. Troubled-Families–Problem Children: Working With Parents: A Collaborative Process. Chichester, England: Wiley and Sons.

Webster-Stratton, Carolyn H., Terri Hollinsworth, and Mary Kolpacoff. 1989. “The Long-Term Effectiveness and Clinical Significant of Three Cost-Effective Training Programs for Families with Conduct-Problem Children.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 57(4):550–53.

Webster–Stratton, Carolyn H., Mary Kolpacoff, and Terri Hollinsworth. 1988. “Self-Administered Videotape Therapy for Families With Conduct-Problem Children: Comparison With Two Cost-Effective Treatments and a Control Group.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology 56(4):558–66.

Webster–Stratton, Carolyn H., M. Jamila Reid, and Theodore P. Beauchaine. 2011. “Combining Parent and Child Training for Young Children With ADHD.” Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology 40(2):1–13.

Webster–Stratton, Carolyn H., Julie Rinaldi, and M. Jamila Reid. 2010. “Long-Term Outcomes of the Incredible Years Parenting Program: Predictors of Adolescent Adjustment.” Child and Adolescent Mental Health 16(1):38–46.

Webster–Stratton, Carolyn, M. Jamila Reid, and Mary A. Hammond. 2004. “Treating Children With Early-Onset Conduct Problems: Intervention Outcomes for Parent, Child, and Teacher Training.” Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychology 33:105–24.

Webster–Stratton, Carolyn H., M. Jamila Reid, and Mike Stoolmiller. 2008. “Preventing Conduct Problems and Improving School Readiness: Evaluation of the Incredible Years Teacher and Child Training Programs in High-Risk Schools.” Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 49:471–88.

 
Program Specification:
Program Type:
Academic Skills Enhancement
Conflict Resolution / Interpersonal Skills
Family Therapy
Parent Training
School/Classroom Environment
Ethnicity:
Asian
African American
Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander
Hispanic or Latino (of any race)
White
Other Ethnicity
Gender:
Both
Age: Early Childhood: 0 to 4 years
Elementary School: 5 to 10 years
Special Populations:
Mentally Ill Offenders
Target Settings:
Suburban
Urban
Problem Behaviors:
Aggression/Violence
Family Functioning
Incorrigibility
 
Additional Information:
Endorsements:
Department of Education
HHS: Surgeon General
NIJ: What Works
OJJDP/CSAP: Strengthen Families
OJJDP: Blueprints
SAMHSA: NREPP

Status:

Program is in operation at this time.

Performance Measures:
Suggested OJJDP Performance Measures for the Program Types(s):
Contact Information:
Program Developer:
Carolyn H. Webster–Stratton, Ph.D.
The Incredible Years
1411 Eighth Avenue West
Seattle, WA 98119
Phone: 888.506.3562
Fax: 206.285.7565
Email: lisastgeorge@comcast.net
 WebSite: http://www.incredibleyears.com

Training & TA Provider:
Lisa St. George, Program Director
The Incredible Years, Inc.
1411 Eighth Avenue West
Seattle, WA 98119
Phone: 206.285.7565
Fax: 206.285.7565

Email: lisastgeorge@comcast.net
 WebSite: http://www.incredibleyears.com/

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OJJDP Deinstitutionalization of Status Offenders Best Practices Database
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