Feasibility, Development and Dissemination of a Father Focused Parenting Intervention, DadPlay

Abstract While programs targeting parenting skills are effective in early childhood, many parenting programs unintentionally work against father inclusion and fail to engage, retain or measure men’s participation. We developed DadPlay , an mHealth intervention, intended for fathers of young children with a focus on supporting positive behaviour and father-child relationships. In this paper, we report the feasibility of DadPlay , tested in real-world community settings, with a focus on four aspects of feasibility: Demand, Acceptability, Implementation and Perceived Impact. Participants were eligible for the intervention if they were fathers of a pre-school-aged child. A service network was established as a reference group, including family and child-focused non-government charities and organisations, as well as preschools located across Australia. Regarding Demand for DadPlay , of the approximately 340 organisations we approached, 57% agreed to disseminate information, and 325 parents submitted an Expression of Interest, of which 108 fathers completed enrolment, and 96 completed the programme. The message content and programme features of DadPlay were high in Acceptability. For Implementation, while Reach was vast, Efficiency of dissemination was low relative to the effort required, with some exceptions. A low post-programme response rate limits our Perceived Impact findings; however, summary statistics showed that responding fathers perceived improvements in their confidence and relationship quality. Overall, these findings suggest DadPlay was considered acceptable by fathers and has the potential to support fathers of young children. To scale up and sustain such initiatives, we need to better collaborate and co-create with fathers, professionals and organisations.