[Effectiveness of an educational intervention in improving the self concept of second to sixth grade students]. / Efficacité d'une intervention éducative à améliorer le concept de soi d'élèves de 2e à 6e année.

This study evaluated the effectiveness of an intervention in improving the general, academic, physical and social self-concepts of 2nd to 6th grade students. The activities were carried out by the teachers during the 1992-93 school year. A questionnaire was completed by 271 students of the experimental school and by 467 students of the control school, both before and after the intervention. The multiple regression analyses showed important adjusted gains for self-concepts related to physical appearance, mathematics and relationship with parents. In all three cases, students with the largest deficit benefitted most from the intervention. This study shows that it is possible to improve self-concept and to do so through an intervention carried out in the school environment. This double finding is important to the promotion of psycho-social adaptation since self-concept is an important determinant and since few interventions have reached similar objectives.

Parental support: effects of a mass-media intervention.

Although face-to-face parental support programs have been shown to improve parents' knowledge, attitudes and behaviour, such interventions are relatively costly to administer. This article reports the findings of a quasi-experimental evaluation of a relatively less costly, mass-media intervention: an age-paced newsletter for new parents. Readership and effectiveness of the newsletter were assessed after three years of distribution. Evaluation participants were 453 randomly selected fathers and mothers of three-year-olds, of which 193 were newsletter recipients and 260 were nonrecipients. Results showed that readership and satisfaction were high. Modest effects were found among mothers in the experimental group on knowledge and perception of existing community resources. Experimental mothers also tended to display greater knowledge of child development. No significant effects of the newsletter were found for fathers. The discussion centres on the potential for this type of intervention strategy to optimize existing investment in public family support programs.

{Evaluation after three years of early intervention for parental support}. / Evaluation après trois ans d'une intervention précoce de soutien au rôle parental.

This article reports the findings of a quasi-experimental evaluation of a newsletter for new parents which was adapted to the age of their children. Satisfaction with and the effectiveness of the intervention after three years of distribution were assessed. As in a previous evaluation undertaken after one year, the newsletter enjoyed widespread readership in the experimental families and among their friends and relatives. Compared to this previous evaluation, similar but stronger effects on aspects of the parental role were found, although these were confined to mothers. Mothers in the experimental group displayed greater knowledge of family support resources and had more favourable attitudes toward them than mothers in the comparison group. They also tended to display greater knowledge of child development. The discussion centres on the study's implications for research and the advisability of broadening this form of intervention.

Evaluation of an early, mass media parental support intervention.

This article reports on the evaluation of Parents Magazine, an age-paced newsletter distributed to parents starting with the birth of their children. The evaluation was carried out after the newsletter's first year of circulation. Measures were taken of reader satisfaction as well as impact on parents' knowledge, attitudes and behavior toward education and use of community resources. Findings indicated that the newsletter's penetration of families and their natural milieu was strong but that it had a limited impact. However, the parents who received the newsletter developed more positive attitudes toward community resources. The articles discusses the implication of these findings for future research.