Recruiting

Parent Coaching

Sponsor:

University of Pittsburgh

Code:

NCT06725160

Conditions

Depression

Parent-Child Relations

Eligibility Criteria

Sex: All

Age: 4 - 70+

Healthy Volunteers: Accepted

Interventions

Parent Coaching

Active Control

Study Details

Brief summary:

The goal of this mechanistic clinical trial is to examine whether parent-coaching aimed at increasing child positive affect will increase child neural response to reward. The main questions it aims to answer are:

Aim 1. Characterize child neural reward response and its relation to maternal socialization of positive emotions at baseline in healthy young children.

Aim 2. Evaluate how coaching-related changes in maternal socialization of positive emotion expression contribute to increases in child neural reward response over time.

Aim 3. Examine how maternal socialization of positive emotion expression contributes to increases in child neural reward response in the moment.

Participating mother-child dyads will be randomized to either 3 sessions of parent coaching of child positive affect or 3 sessions of a general parenting support intervention and neural response to reward and affective behavior will be examined pre and post intervention.

Conditions

Depression

Parent-Child Relations

Study ID

NCT06725160

Start date

Oct 28, 2025

Status verified date

Jan, 2026

Completion date

Feb 1, 2029

Anticipated

Primary completion date

Feb 1, 2029

Anticipated

Eligibility Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

Sex: All

Age: 4 - 70+

Healthy Volunteers: Accepted

Inclusion Criteria for Mothers:

  • Birth mother (biologically female, any gender)
  • Providing regular care for participating child (i.e., at least 50% of time)
  • Elevated, clinically significant levels of depression (16 or higher on CES-D)
  • Aged 18+

Exclusion Criteria for Mothers:

  • Lifetime history of a bipolar disorder
  • Lifetime history of a psychotic disorder

Inclusion Criteria for Participating Child:

-Aged 4-6 years

Exclusion Criteria for Participating Child:

  • T-score greater than 63 on the internalizing or externalizing composites of the CBCL
  • Lifetime history of a psychiatric illness
  • Lifetime history of neurodevelopmental disorder
  • Lifetime history of neurological disorder

Study Design

Enrollment

180 participants

Anticipated

Allocation

Randomized

Intervention Model

Parallel Assignment

Primary purpose

Basic Science

Interventions and Outcome Measures

Arms

experimental: Parent Coaching

Parents will receive 3 sessions based on PCIT-ED aimed at increasing child positive affect.

active comparator: Active Control

Parents will receive 3 sessions based on traditional PCIT providing more general parenting supporting, including basic psychoeducation and parenting skills.

Interventions

Parent Coaching

Three sessions of parent coaching of child positive affect will be administered based on modules from PCIT-ED.

Active Control

General parent support and psychoeducation based on components of standard PCIT.

Primary outcome measure

  • Reward Positivity (RewP) [ Time Frame: From baseline week 1 to final assessment week 5 (week 10 maximum) ]

Central Contacts and Locations

Central contacts

Julie Research Coordinator

412-509-8787PEACHY@upmc.edu

Locations

University of Pittsburgh

Recruiting

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, 15213

Contacts

Lauren M Bylsma, PhD

412-624-8363BylsmaL@pitt.edu

Judith K Morgan, PhD

412-383-5454jkm46@pitt.edu

More Information

Sponsor

University of Pittsburgh

Last update posted

Jan 28, 2026

Last verified

Jan, 2026

Keywords

  • depression
  • reward
  • neural
  • behavior
  • parent
  • early childhood

Trial information was received from ClinicalTrials.gov and was last updated on 2026-09-10. This information was provided to ClinicalTrials.gov by University of Pittsburgh on 2026-01-28.