Parental training for prevention of antisocial behavior: Basic concepts and own examples

This paper presents the concept of Development Promotion in Families: Parent and Child Training (EntwicklungsFörderung in Familien: Eltern-und Kindertraining, EFFEKT ). The parent training was developed and evaluated as part of the Erlangen-Nuremberg Development and Prevention Study (Lösel et al. Möglichkeiten der Gewaltprävention, S 201-249, 2005; Lösel et al., Z Klin Psychol Psychother 35:127-139, 2006). EFFEKT was constructed as a universal program for the prevention of antisocial behavior in children. In the meantime it has now been extended by several program units: adapted parent training for migrants, adapted training for depressive mothers, training for internationally mobile parents, training for parents of children under the age of 3 years, school children and adolescents. Therefore, it can also be used as a selective prevention program. In addition, the training is used throughout Europe with the help of an internet version of EFFEKT, providing a low threshold for users. This article presents mainly the contents of the training and selected evaluation results. All results prove the successful implementation of all EFFEKT programs. Moreover, the output evaluation of the training suggests substantial effects with regard to the behavior of children. In comparison to the control group, the results of the training groups were superior in almost all evaluation areas. The results suggest that EFFEKT can be used as a universal as well as a selective prevention program. © 2012 Springer-Verlag.