Parents and other caregivers are some of the most important stakeholders in young children's lives, but research and intervention on early childhood development rarely includes any attention to caregiver mental health and wellbeing. A review of 478 experimental and quasi-experimental studies of early childhood development in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), for example, found that only 12 percent of studies reported on maternal mental health and only three percent of studies reported any father-specific outcomes (Evans, Jakiela and Knauer, 2021). We are excited that this is starting to change: in this webinar, we will hear from three researchers about their work across multiple projects to investigate the connection between caregiver mental health and early childhood development.

As part of IPA's Thrive Through Play Community of Practice, this webinar aims to provide relevant insights, reflections, and recommendations for practitioners and other actors working to improve outcomes for both children and their caregivers.

Qi Jiang, Doctoral Candidate in Health Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, will share research from China, including additional research on how the parenting center intervention had different impacts for caregivers in relation to their mental health symptoms.
Andrés Moya, Associate Professor in Economics at Universidad de los Andes, will share work from Colombia, including how caregiver mental health mediates the impacts of conflict on children and considerations for how we can support caregiver mental health through different models.
Dana Charles McCoy, Marie and Max Kargman Associate Professor in Human Development and Urban Education Advancement at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, will share work from Ethiopia and other country contexts that illustrates that a connection between caregiver mental health and child development is not always observed in research and why that might be the case.

We look forward to seeing you on the 27th!

Sincerely,
IPA Team