Editorial: The place of proven models
| Pages | 3-5 |
| Published date | 01 November 2006 |
| Date | 01 November 2006 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/17466660200600019 |
| Author | Michael Little,Nick Axford |
| Subject Matter | Education,Health & social care,Sociology |
3
Journal of Children’s Services
Volume 1 Issue 3 November 2006
©Pavilion Journals (Brighton) Ltd
1Dartington Social
Research Unit, UK
and Chapin Hall
Center for Children,
University of
Chicago, USA
2Dartington Social
Research Unit, UK
Editorial
The place of proven models
Arecurrent theme in this Journal will be reports on
evaluations of services designed to reduce
impairments in children's development or otherwise
enhance their well-being.
There is now a growing bank of evidence on what
are called ‘proven models’. There is no consensus
over what this term means, but for the sake of
discussion it can be defined as a service – typically a
structured programme – that has been demonstrated
in one or moreexperimental evaluations to produce
better outcomes for the children served.
This evidence has been assembled in a number of
databases, examples of which arelisted at the end of
this editorial, and is also brought together in what are
called ‘systematic reviews’ which analyse the
combined results of several trials of the same
programme or series of programmes aimed at specified
impairments to children’s development. The article in
this edition byJane Barlowand her colleagues does
this in relation to services designed to prevent or
ameliorate child physical abuse and neglect.
Some proven models become well known. As
highlighted by John Coughlan’s article, recent
government investments in parenting programmes in
England, for example, have brought attention to
programmes like Triple P, discussed in the previous
edition of the Journal of Children’s Services,and
Incredible Years. There is a strong message that
investments in most of the myriad of parenting
programmes to have emerged in recent years will
bear less reward than investments in one or more of
the ‘proven’models.
Although proven models are more prominent now
in professional discussion than even a few years ago,
their actual implementation in European, North
American and Australasian children’s services
remains rare. Most proven models have been
designed in the US but even there their application
remains very much the exception rather than the rule.
In this context the case for proven models seems
straightforward. It is hard to imagine their greater use
being a problem and there are clearly many potential
benefits. The obvious gain will be better outcomes for
children. The websites listed at the end of this
editorial contain programmes shown to have reduced
emotional, social, educational and behavioural
impairments to children’s development.
But as important is the rigour used to design and
evaluate proven models. It takes considerable
discipline and good science to develop models like
Multi-Systemic Treatment, High/Scope or Nurse Family
Partnership – to name just three of the programmes
commonly referred to on the databases. That discipline
will typically result in a manual that itemises howthe
programme should be delivered and a clear view of the
target group to ensure that only those children known
to benefit actually receivethe service. The process will
also generate a clear logic model, so that those
involved know why the programme works, and an
understanding of what will be achieved, so that
expectations can be realistic. Many proven models also
pay better attention to the ethics of service delivery.
It would be a mistake, however, to see proven
models as a panacea. Care needs to be taken in their
application and it is possible to see how their use
might become counter-productive.
Perhaps the most pressing concerns are ecological
validity and cultural competence. Regarding the
former, a programme may work effectively in the
context in which it is tested but remain largely
irrevelant to daily practice with children in need.
Some parenting programmes, for example, are
initially tested in very carefully controlled conditions
with unusually high investment of resources. The
results will be important to the development of a new
programme but they should not, of themselves, urge
the wholesale application of the programme.
Surprisingly little attention is given to the related
question of cultural competence. Few would imagine
that a model shown to work in London would be
immediately relevant to practitioners in the
developing world. Yet there can often be an
Michael Little1and Nick Axford2
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