Study: Online Parent Training as Effective as Face-to-Face in Helping Kids with ADHD

Four-year-old Owen struggled to sit still or stay on task. He was impulsive and loud, unable to regulate his noise level. While he spent hours playing with blocks or Legos, when bored or uninterested in a task he was disruptive and inattentive.

Owen’s parents, Barbara and Jeffery Barthold, signed on to participate in a pilot randomized controlled trial led by Lehigh researchers to study whether a 10-week training session for parents of young children at-risk for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) would impact children’s behavior—and how an online version of the training compared to a face-to-face format. The Bartholds participated in the in-person program.

Lehigh researchers George DuPaul, professor of school psychology, and Lee Kern, professor of special education, found that brief online or in-person behavioral therapy for parents was equally effective in improving children’s behavior and parental knowledge. The discovery is a potential game changer for parents strapped for time and resources to help children whose inattention, distractibility and impulsiveness affects school and home.

Kern and DuPaul reported their findings in a recent paper in The Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, “Face-to-Face vs. Online Behavioral Parent Training for Young Children At-Risk for ADHD: Treatment Engagement and Outcomes.” The research is the first to look at online ADHD behavior therapies in this age group (3-5 years old). It was conducted with a $1.2 million grant from the Institute of Education Sciences, the research arm of the U.S. Department of Education.