About the Project

Mothers who are exposed to trauma or instability in their environments may be more likely to use harsh physical discipline, which can impact the parent-child relationship and lead to poor child outcomes. One mechanism linking low resource environments and maladaptive parenting strategies is maternal delay discounting, or the tendency to value smaller, immediate rewards (such as stopping children's misbehavior via physical means) relative to larger, but delayed rewards (like improving the parent-child relationship). This study examined the efficacy of implementing a peer mother-delivered, low-cost, brief intervention targeting the reduction of maternal delay discounting to increase mothers’ focus on their future relationship with their children and to inform broader public health efforts aimed at improving child mental health outcomes.