Coping Power
Coping Power is a schools-based and parenting programme. It is a targeted indicated programme for children between the ages of 9 and 15 years, and their parents. It is delivered in schools, outpatient clinics and community centers, and aims to improve externalising and aggressive behaviour and substance misuse.
Coping Power aims to promote social cognitive processes, emotion regulation and effective parenting practices in order to protect against externalizing behaviour problems, aggressive behaviour, and substance misuse. The target population includes children who are identified as aggressive or disrupted.
During the programme, group sessions are held for children and parents, separately, led by a psychologist or social worker and a trained school counsellor. They include group discussion, role-play, videos, and behavioural goal-setting. These are aimed at enhancing children's social perspective taking, goal setting, problem solving, social skills, and resistance to peer pressure, and at enhancing parents' positive parenting, effective discipline and monitoring, family cohesion, and stress management.
EIF Programme Assessment
Child outcomes
This programme can affect outcomes for children in Active and healthy, physical and mental wellbeing.
According to the best available evidence for this programme's impact, it can achieve the following positive outcomes for children:
Preventing crime, violence and antisocial behaviour
Reduced aggressive behaviour
based on study 1
Reduced delinquency
based on study 2
based on study 3
This programme also has evidence of supporting positive outcomes for couples, parents or families that may be relevant to a commissioning decision. Please see About the evidence for more detail.
Who is it for?
The best available evidence for this programme relates to the following age-groups:
Primary school Preadolescents Adolescents
How is it delivered?
The best available evidence for this programme relates to implementation through these delivery models:
- Group
Where is it delivered?
The best available evidence for this programme relates to its implementation in these settings:
How is it targeted?
The best available evidence for this programme relates to its implementation as:
- Targeted indicated
Where has it been implemented?
- United States
- Canada
- Australia
- Singapore
- Ireland
- Italy
- Netherlands
- Sweden
- Pakistan
Ireland provision
Ireland evaluation
About the programme
What happens during the delivery?
How is it delivered?
- The child component of Coping Power is delivered in 24-36 sessions of one hour duration each by two practitioners to groups of children.
- The parent component of Coping Power is delivered in 12-16 sessions of one hour duration each by two practitioners to a group of parents.
What happens during the intervention?
- During the intervention children and parents engage in group discussion, role-play, and setting goals in school or home. They receive homework and positive feedback. Videos are also used in the sessions.
- Child sessions include behavioural and personal goal-setting, awareness of feelings, distraction techniques, relaxation methods, organisational skills and refusal skills.
- Parent sessions focus on rewarding appropriate child behaviour, giving effective instructions, establishing age-appropriate rules and expectations, applying consequences, and establishing good family communication.
What are the implementation requirements?
Who can deliver it?
- The practitioner who delivers this programme is a counsellor with QCF-7/8 level qualifications.
What are the training requirements?
- The practitioners have 32 hours of programme training. Booster training of practitioners is recommended.
How are the practitioners supervised?
- It is recommended that practitioners are supervised by one clinical supervisor (qualified to QCF-7 level), with 14 hours of programme training.
What are the systems for maintaining fidelity?
Programme fidelity is maintained through the following processes:
- Training manual
- Fidelity monitoring
Is there a licensing requirement?
There is no licence required to run this programme.
How does it work? (Theory of Change)
How does it work?
- Social cognitive processes, emotion regulation and effective parenting practices protect against externalising behaviour problems, delinquent behaviour, and substance misuse.
- Coping Power enhances children's social perspective-taking, goal setting, problem solving, social skills, and resistance to peer pressure, and enhances parents' positive parenting, effective discipline and monitoring, family cohesion, and stress management.
- Children receiving Coping Power have reductions in hostile attributions of others, and increases in more competent problem-solving and awareness of consequences for behaviours. Parents interact with children with more positively and with more consistent discipline.
- There is a reduction in children’s externalising behaviour problems, and in the risk of problem aggressive and criminal behaviour and substance misuse.
Intended outcomes
Contact details
Shane Jones
jones178@ua.edu
About the evidence
Coping Power’s most rigorous evidence comes from an RCT which was conducted in the US. This study identified statistically significant positive impact on child outcomes. This programme has evidence from at least one rigorously conducted RCT along with evidence from an additional comparison group study. Consequently, the programme receives a 3+ rating overall.
Study 1
| Citation: | Lochman et al., 2009 |
| Design: | RCT |
| Country: | United States |
| Sample: | 531 children between 8 and 9 years old (recruited in 3rd grade). They had been screened and recruited from the 30% most aggressive children, according to a screening assessment by their teachers. |
| Timing: | Post-test |
| Child outcomes: |
|
| Other outcomes: | |
| Study rating: | 3 |
Lochman, J. E., Boxmeyer, C., Powell, N., Qu, L., Wells, K., & Windle, M. (2009). Dissemination of the Coping Power program: Importance of intensity of counselor training. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 77(3), 397–409
Available at
Study design and sample
The first study is a rigorously conducted RCT. This study involved random assignment of children to two treatment groups (Coping Power with training and feedback for practitioners, and with basic training for practitioners) and a Business As Usual control group. This study was conducted in the United States, with a sample of children who had been screened as being in the 30% most aggressive children, based on a teacher assessment. 65% of the sample were boys. The children were from Alabama, US. 84% of children in the sample were African Americans, 14% were Caucasians and 2% of other ethnicity.
Measures
- Assaultive behaviours were measured using the National Youth Survey (child self-report).
- Substance misuse was measured using the National Youth survey (child self-report).
- Behavioural problems were measured using the Behaviour Assessment System for Children (parent and teacher report).
Findings
This study identified a statistically significant positive impact on a child outcome. This includes assaultive behaviour. Note that the positive findings were only for the group with more intense training for practitioners (training and feedback).
Two further papers describe the same trial but do not record significant child outcomes:
- Lochman, J.E., Powell, N.P., Boxmeyer, C.L., Qu, L., Wells, K.C., & Windle, M. (2009). Implementation of a school-based prevention program: Effects of counselor and school characteristics. Professional Psychology: Resarch and Practice, 40(5), 476-482. FIELD TRIAL
- Lochman, J. E., Boxmeyer, C. L., Powell, N. P., Qu, L., Wells, K., & Windle, M. (2012). Coping Power dissemination study: Intervention and special education effects on academic outcomes. Behavioral Disorders, 37(3), 192-205.
Study 2
| Citation: | Lochman & Wells., 2003 |
| Design: | RCT |
| Country: | United States |
| Sample: | 245 children in 5th and 6th grade. They had been screened and recruited from the 31% most aggressive children, according to a screening assessment by their teachers. |
| Timing: | 1 year follow-up |
| Child outcomes: |
|
| Other outcomes: | |
| Study rating: | 3 |
Lochman, J. E., & Wells, K. C., (2003). Effectiveness of the Coping Power Program and of Classroom Intervention With Aggressive Children: Outcomes at a 1-Year Follow-Up. Behavior Therapy 34. 493-515, 2003
Available at
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0005789403800321
Study design and sample
The second study is an RCT. This study involved random assignment of children to one of four conditions: 1) Coping Power only, 2) A universal classroom-level intervention only, 3) Coping Power plus the universal classroom-level intervention and 4) Business as Usual control group. This study was conducted in the United States. Children received the intervention when they were in 5th and 6th grade. The findings in this study were collected 1-year post-intervention. Two-thirds of the sample were boys, and majority identified as African American, followed by a minority of Caucasian children, with only two Hispanic children and four other nationalities.
Measures
- Aggressive behaviour in the school setting was measured by the Teacher Observation of Classroom Adaption-Revised (TOCA-R) (teacher report)
- Substance use was measured by the Centre for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) Student Survey (child self-report)
- Delinquency was measured by items drawn from the National Youth Survey (child self-report)
Findings
This study identified a statistically significant positive impact on one child outcome. This includes a reduction in delinquency for those in the Coping Power only group. Note that the conclusions from this study can only be drawn from the findings for the Coping Power only group, compared to the control group.
Two further papers describe the same trial but did not contribute to the rating due to methodological issues:
- Lochman, J. E., & Wells, K. C. (2002). The Coping Power program at the middle-school transition: Universal and indicated prevention effects. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 16(4S), S40-S54.
- Lochman, J. E., Wells, K. C., Qu, L., & Chen, L. (2013). Three year follow-up of Coping Power intervention effects: Evidence of neighborhood moderation? Prevention Science, 14(4), 364-376.
Study 3
| Citation: | Lochman & Wells., 2004 |
| Design: | RCT |
| Country: | United States |
| Sample: | 183 boys between 9 and 11 years old (fourth and fifth grade). They had been screened and recruited from the 22% most aggressive children, according to a screening assessment by their teachers. |
| Timing: | Post-test; 1 year follow-up |
| Child outcomes: |
|
| Other outcomes: | |
| Study rating: | 2 |
Lochman, J. E., & Wells, K. C. (2004). The Coping Power Programs for preadolescent aggressive boys and their parents: Outcome effects at the 1-year follow-up. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 72(4), 571-578.
Available at
Study design and sample
The third study is an RCT.
This study involved random assignment of children to two treatment groups (Coping Power for children only, and Coping Power for children and parents – multicomponent) and a Business as Usual control group. This study was conducted in the United States, with a sample of boys aged 9-11 years. 55% of the boys were in fourth grade at the start of the intervention, and 45% in fifth grade. 61% were African American, 38% Caucasian and 1% other ethnicity.
Measures
- Overt and covert delinquency were measured at one-year post-intervention using the National Youth Survey (child self-report)
- Substance use was measured using the National Youth Survey (child self-report).
Findings
This study identified statistically significant positive impact on one child outcome.
This includes a reduction in covert delinquency.
The conclusions that can be drawn from this study are limited by methodological issues pertaining to statistical models not controlling for baseline differences between the groups hence why a higher rating is not achieved.
Vanzin, L., Colombo, P., Valli, A., Mauri, V., Ceccarelli, S. B., Pozzi, M., ... & Nobile, M. (2018). The effectiveness of coping power program for ADHD: an observational outcome study. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 27(11), 3554-3563. This study was excluded due to methodological issues relating to the randomisation process.
Aitken, M., Waxman, J. A., MacDonald, K., & Andrade, B. F. (2018). Effect of Comorbid Psychopathology and Conduct Problem Severity on Response to a Multi-component Intervention for Childhood Disruptive Behavior. Child Psychiatry & Human Development https://doi.org/10.1007/s10578-018-0800-1 This study was excluded because it has no comparison group, and cannot contribute to the programme rating.
Eiraldi, R., Mautone, J. A., Khanna, M. S., Power, T. J., Orapallo, A., Cacia, J., Schwartz, B. S., McCurdy, B., Keiffer, J., Paidipati, C., Kanine, R., Abraham, M., Tulio, S., Swift, L., Bressler, S. N., Cabello, B., & Jawad, A. F. (2018). Group CBT for externalizing disorders in urban schools: Effect of training strategy on treatment fidelity and child outcomes. Behavior Therapy . This study was excluded because it has no comparison group, and cannot contribute to the programme rating.
McDaniel, S. C., Lochman, J. E., Tomek, S., Powell, N., Irwin, A., & Kerr, S. (2018). Reducing levels of behavioral risk in late elementary school: A comparison of two targeted interventions. Behavioral Disorders, 43, 370-382. This study was excluded due to a low sample size.
In addition, a number of other studies were identified but excluded because they evaluated a different version of the programme (12 studies), a significantly different population (2 studies), or two different interventions (2 studies).