Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2024 May-Jun;45(3):e225-e234.
doi: 10.1097/DBP.0000000000001248. Epub 2024 Feb 21.

Measuring Early Relational Health Using PediaTrac TM in a Diverse Sample of Infant-Caregiver Dyads

Alissa Huth-Bocks  1   2 , Shannon Franz  3 , Patricia A Berglund  4 , Heather M Schroeder  4 , Angela D Staples  5 , Trivellore Raghunathan  4 , Seth Warschausky  3 , H Gerry Taylor  6 , Gabrielle LeDoux  5 , Lesa Dieter  2 , Katherine Rosenblum  7 , Renee Lajiness-O'Neill  5 ; on behalf of The PediaTrac Consortium
Affiliations

Measuring Early Relational Health Using PediaTrac TM in a Diverse Sample of Infant-Caregiver Dyads

Alissa Huth-Bocks et al. J Dev Behav Pediatr. 2024 May-Jun.

Abstract

Objective: Early relational health (ERH) is a key developmental predictor and outcome in infancy and early childhood that reflects social-emotional well-being and promotes resilience throughout childhood. Currently, there is no gold-standard developmental screening tool for ERH in pediatric care settings. This study examined the psychometric properties of items assessing ERH that are part of a web-based, caregiver-report screening tool called PediaTrac TM . It was hypothesized that ERH could be reliably estimated and that second-order factors would be revealed within the latent construct ERH.

Method: Participants included 571 caregivers of term (n = 331; ≥37 weeks) and preterm (n = 240; <37 weeks) infants recruited shortly after birth from several academic medical centers and a community health clinic. Caregivers completed PediaTrac modules at birth and 2, 4, 6, 9, 12, 15, and 18 months; data for this study are from the newborn through 12-month periods.

Results: Results from Item Response Theory Graded Response Modeling revealed excellent reliability for the PediaTrac ERH domain at all time points, ranging from 0.96 to 0.98. Exploratory factor analyses revealed 4 to 5 second-order factors, representing Parent-Child Relationship, Parent Distress, Parenting Stress, Parenting Efficacy, Sensitivity, and Perceptions of Child, depending on period.

Conclusion: The caregiver-report developmental screening tool, PediaTrac, reliably measures ERH during the first year of life. The measure has promising clinical utility in pediatric clinic settings for tracking ERH over time to ensure early social-emotional well-being and to identify concerns as early as possible.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Total information and reliability curves for PediaTrac Early Relational Health (ERH) domains by time point.
Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Total information and reliability curves for PediaTrac Early Relational Health (ERH) domains by time point.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Garner A, Yogman M, COMMITTEE ON PSYCHOSOCIAL ASPECTS OF CHILD AND FAMILY HEALTH, SECTION ON DEVELOPMENTAL AND BEHAVIORAL PEDIATRICS, COUNCIL ON EARLY CHILDHOOD. Preventing childhood toxic stress: Partnering with families and communities to promote relational health. Pediatrics. 2021;148(2):e2021052582. doi:10.1542/peds.2021-052582 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Frameworks Institute. Building relationships: Framing early relational health. Center for the Study of Social Policy; 2020. Accessed April 21, 2023. https://www.frameworksinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/FRAJ8069-...
    1. Willis DW, Condon MC, Moe V, Munson L, Smith L, Eddy JM. The context and development of the early relational health screen. Infant Ment Health J. 2022;43(3):493–506. doi:10.1002/imhj.21986 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Sroufe LA, Egeland B, Carlson EA, Collins WA. The Development of the Person: The Minnesota Study of Risk and Adaptation from Birth to Adulthood. Guilford Publications; 2005.
    1. De Wolff MS, van Ijzendoorn MH. Sensitivity and attachment: a meta-analysis on parental antecedents of infant attachment. Child Dev. 1997;68(4):571–591. 10.2307/1132107 - DOI - PubMed

Publication types