Supporting parenting practices through an intervention device aimed at primary caregivers
Keywords:
child development promotion, families, educational guidance, child development, povertyAbstract
The aim of this study is to describe and analyze the implementation of a Parent-Mediated Intervention (PMI) device aimed at caregivers of children aged 18 to 42 months from marginalized urban sectors. Its purpose was to support parenting practices, with an emphasis on promoting communicative and linguistic development. The intervention consisted of a four-session workshop, each lasting two hours. It is inspired by other sociopragmatically-based PMI programs and introduces new strategies grounded in a multireferential model of change. A total of 40 caregivers and 7 educators and health professionals participated. As part of an ethnographic methodology, a field diary and recordings of the final moments of each session were produced and analyzed using Multireferential Analysis and the Constant Comparative Method.The results describe the implementation process from three perspectives: instrumental, social, and psychic. Secondly, the effects identified by participants are presented: the device appears to have enhanced caregivers' knowledge and fostered awareness of key aspects for scaffolding early childhood development. The findings are discussed through a reconstruction of participants' trajectories according to the multireferential model of change.The study highlights the original contributions of this implementation compared to other dyadic parent-mediated interventions: direct experience and theatrical expectation as sources of knowledge. The conclusions point to the need for further exploration of this developmental promotion strategy.
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