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The Supporting Parents Project

The Supporting Parents Project is a two-arm, multi-site randomised controlled trial (RCT).

The project aims to evaluate the Lighthouse Parenting Programme (LPP) in children's social care for parents of a child aged 12 or under who is on a child in need or child protection plan or in pre-proceedings. 

The LPP is an adaptation of mentalization based treatment (MBT) and has been specifically developed for parents for with child welfare involvement. A pilot evaluation of LPP found that it may be effective in improving parenting confidence and sensitivity and that parents valued the programme and the changes it had helped them to bring about. This study aims to scale up and evaluate the programme on a wider scale in an RCT. It will include an evaluation of outcomes for families, an evaluation of the implementation and process and an evaluation of costs.

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Publications

Sleed, M., Fearon, P., Midgley, N., Martin, P., Byrne, G., & Zywek, L. (2021). Trial Protocol for The Supporting Parents Project: A randomised controlled trial of the Lighthouse Parenting Programme. OSF. https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/GXYS9  

Byrne, G., Sleed, M., Midgley, N., Fearon, P., Mein, C., Bateman, A., & Fonagy, P. (2018). Lighthouse Parenting Programme: Description and pilot evaluation of mentalization-based treatment to address child maltreatment. Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 24(4), 680–693. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359104518807741 

Byrne, G. (2020). "And whatever you say, you say nothing" Establishing epistemic trust in The Lighthouse MBT-parenting programme: a case study. Journal of Psychological Therapies, 5(2), 206-228. https://doi.org/10.33212/jpt.v5n2.2020.206  

Chief investigator: Michelle Sleed

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