Mobile parenting support to boost young children's development in rural Kenya
Official title: Achieving Sustained Early Child Development Impacts at Scale: a Kenyan RCT
Funded at University of Southern California · NIH-11397659 · Data updated 2026-11-12
This project offers low-cost mobile messages and community health worker support to help parents in rural Kenya improve the learning, language, and behavior of children under age five.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R01 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | University of Southern California NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Los Angeles, UNITED STATES) |
| Project start | September 30, 2022 |
| Project end | July 31, 2026 |
| Funding year | 2025 |
| Award (this year) | $108,731 |
| NIH project number | 3R01HD107116-04S1 |
| Project ID | NIH-11397659 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Ideal participants are parents or caregivers of young children (typically under age five) living in participating rural Kenyan communities who can receive messages on a cell phone.
✕Less likely to help
Families without reliable access to a mobile phone, or children beyond the early childhood period, may not receive benefit from this program.
What this research studies
If you join, your village will be randomly assigned to receive a low-cost mobile parenting program or the usual services, and families will be followed over time. The program sends regular messages and learning activities by cell phone and includes support from community health workers and occasional group meetings to help parents use the activities with their young children. Researchers will measure children's thinking, language, and social development and ask about parenting practices at several follow-up visits. The goal is to see whether a mobile approach can keep early gains over the long term while costing less than traditional group-based programs.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, this could provide families a low-cost, scalable way to improve and sustain young children's learning and behavior in rural Kenya.
How similar studies have gone: Group-based early childhood programs in similar settings have improved child development, but mobile-only delivery in low-resource rural areas has been little tested and remains relatively novel.
Where this research is happening
-
University of Southern California
Los Angeles, United States Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Lopez Garcia, Italo — University of Southern California
- Study coordinator: Lopez Garcia, Italo
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About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.