Engaging Families in Treatment for Child Behavior Disorders: A Synthesis of the Literature

This chapter synthesizes the literature pertaining both to parental engagement in treatments for child disruptive behavior disorders (DBDs), and to the importance of parental engagement for child treatment outcomes. In addition, it presents a set of promising efforts to enhance engagement, particularly for those families who struggle with the challenges associated with poverty and chronic stress and who are least likely to utilize the current child mental health service system. Parent training programs are among the best studied and most efficacious treatments for DBDs. Parental engagement is considered essential to behavior parent training (BPT) treatments, either with or without the child present during sessions, depending on the program. Parental attributions have been shown to be related to engagement in BPT. The chapter examines the training intervention for the engagement of families (TIES) that involves educating mental health professionals in regard to the common barriers faced by families.