Prenatal and infancy home visitation in Germany: The pilot project "Pro Kind"
The pilot project "Pro Kind" is an adaptation of the NFP program focusing on the improvement of neuro-developmental, cognitive, and behavioral functioning of the child by enhancing prenatal health, family functioning and economic self-sufficiency, as well as reducing child abuse and neglect in the first two years of the child's life (Olds, 1997, 1998). The biweekly practical work of the home visitors was structured by visit-to-visit-guidelines and grounded in theories of human ecology (Bronfenbrenner, 1992), self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977), and human attachment (Bowlby, 1969).
"Pro Kind" registered volunteering low-income first-time mothers as soon as possible in their pregnancy. Additional target group criteria included e.g. being under age, poor education, substance abuse, and own experiences of violence or neglect.
In order to evaluate if home visiting in Germany is a means of breaking the link between early adverse circumstances and developmental problems a longitudinal randomized control group design was realized. Women were assigned at random either to the treatment or to the control group. Members of both groups got various supplies (e.g. information about existing health or social services, repayment for travel expenses to preventive medical check-ups, reimbursement for regular research attendance, feedback about the child's developmental status), but only the women of the treatment group received the described home visitation. Data were collected at program intake before randomization (baseline; t0), by the end of pregnancy (app. at 36 weeks of gestation; t1), and at 6 (t2), 12 (t3) and 24 (t4) months of child's age. Face-to-face interviews with detailed standardized questionnaires were conducted at every assessment. Postnatally, data concerning the children's mental and psychomotor development (Bayley Scales of Infant Development-II; Reuner et al., 2007) as well as their language development (SETK-2, Grimm, 2000) are collected by trained interviewers.
Funding body: Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth, the Free State of Saxony, the Dürr-Foundation, the Reimann-Dubbers-Foundation and the Tui-Foundation
Research team: Dr. Susan Sierau, Dr. Annette Klein, Prof. Dr. Kai von Klitzing
In cooperation with: the Criminological Research Institute of Lower-Saxony: Prof. Dr .Christian Pfeiffer, Vivien Kurtz, Tilman Brand, the Leibniz University of Hannover: PD Dr. Peter Lutz, Malte Sandner, and the Medical School of Hannover: Prof. Dr H. Günay, Peggy Herrmann, and Prof. Dr. Tanja Jungmann (University of Rostock)
Project period: 2006 (in Saxony from 2008) until 2012