Little All Children in Focus (Little ACF) – evaluation of a parenting support programme for parents of children aged 1–2 years in Sweden: a randomised controlled trial

Abstract Introduction The first two years of life affect health over the life course. Universal parenting support programmes may promote child health during these years but there is a lack of such evidence-based programmes. Our aim was to study the direct effects of a structured 4 sessions universal parenting programme for parents with children 1–2 years old, Little All Children in Focus, in Sweden. Methods A two-arm parallel randomised controlled superiority trial with 832 Swedish-speaking parents was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the Little All Children In Focus programme in comparison with an active control receiving four digital lectures on child development and parenthood. The participants completed questionnaires at baseline and post intervention measuring the primary outcomes: parenting self-efficacy and stress, coparenting quality, emotion regulation for parents and emotion regulation strategies for their children, and secondary outcome: child socioemotional development. A third research question concerned whether the intervention could engage and retain parents in groups. An intention-to-treat approach was applied using linear mixed models for analysing the effectiveness of the programme. Results Parents who participated in the programme demonstrated greater improvements in supportive emotion regulation strategies compared to the active control ( $$\beta$$ = 3.0, CI = 0.9 – 5.0), while no notable group differences emerged across the remaining outcome measures. The program demonstrated high levels of parental engagement and retention in group settings. Conclusions Little All Children in Focus demonstrates potential in promoting supportive parenting emotion regulation strategies among Swedish speaking parents to 1–2-year-olds. The intervention also seems to have potential to engage parents. However, further evaluations must be conducted to provide a deeper understanding of the long-term impact of this universal parenting support programme. Trial registration The study protocol https://rdcu.be/eAxn2 was published at www.clinicaltrials.gov with registration number: NCT05445141 (registered on July 06, 2022).