A Digital Parenting Intervention With Intimate Partner Violence Prevention Content: Quantitative Pre-Post Pilot Study (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Intimate partner violence (IPV) and violence against children are global issues with severe consequences. Intersections shared by the 2 forms of violence have led to calls for joint programming efforts to prevent both IPV and violence against children. Parenting programs have been identified as a key entry point for addressing multiple forms of family violence. Building on the IPV prevention material that has been integrated into the parenting program ParentText, a digital parenting chatbot, this pilot study seeks to explore parents’ engagement with the IPV prevention content in ParentText and explore preliminary changes in IPV. OBJECTIVE This study aimed to assess parents’ and caregivers’ level of engagement with the IPV prevention material in the ParentText chatbot and explore preliminary changes in experiences and perpetration of IPV, attitudes toward IPV, and gender-equitable behaviors following the intervention. METHODS Caregivers of children aged between 0 and 18 years were recruited through convenience sampling by research assistants in Cape Town, South Africa, and by UNICEF (United Nations Children's Fund) Jamaica staff in 3 parishes of Jamaica. Quantitative data from women in Jamaica (n=28) and South Africa (n=19) and men in South Africa (n=21) were collected electronically via weblinks sent to caregivers’ phones using Open Data Kit. The primary outcome was IPV experience (women) and perpetration (men), with secondary outcomes including gender-equitable behaviors and attitudes toward IPV. Descriptive statistics were used to report sociodemographic characteristics and engagement outcomes. Chi-square tests and 2-tailed paired dependent-sample t tests were used to investigate potential changes in IPV outcomes between pretest and posttest. RESULTS The average daily interaction rate with the program was 0.57 and 0.59 interactions per day for women and men in South Africa, and 0.21 for women in Jamaica. The rate of completion of at least 1 IPV prevention topic was 25% (5/20) for women and 5% (1/20) for men in South Africa, and 21% (6/28) for women in Jamaica. Exploratory analyses indicated significant pre-post reductions in overall IPV experience among women in South Africa (P=.01) and Jamaica (P=.01) and in men’s overall harmful IPV attitudes (P=.01) and increases in men’s overall gender-equitable behaviors (P=.02) in South Africa. CONCLUSIONS To the best of our knowledge, this is the first pilot study to investigate user engagement with and indicative outcomes of a digital parenting intervention with integrated IPV prevention content. Study findings provide valuable insights into user interactions with the chatbot and shed light on challenges related to low levels of chatbot engagement. Indicative results suggest promising yet modest reductions in IPV and improvements in attitudes after the program. Further research using a randomized controlled trial is warranted to establish causality.