Parents as Advocates for Child Pedestrian Injury Prevention: What Do They Believe About the Efficacy of Prevention Strategies and About How to Create Change?

This study describes the support of parents and other community members for child pedestrian safety measures, their willingness to pay in terms of volunteer time and money for efforts to make child pedestrian safety improvements in their neighborhood, and their views on how to affect child pedestrian safety improvements in their communities. In partnership with four city public elementary schools, data were collected through focus groups of parents and other caregivers and through a written survey distributed to parents and caregivers. The findings reveal that parents and caregivers are aware of a full range of prevention measures for the child pedestrian injury problem but are especially supportive of speed bumps, safety education for parents, and better traffic enforcement. Parents and caregivers are uncertain about what kind of strategies would work well to get changes made in their communities to protect child pedestrians. They also reveal that they are willing to get involved in trying to get changes made. Parents and other community members can be willing and effective partners in injury prevention, but they can benefit from receiving more information about the value of environmental prevention measures and from skillbuilding in injury prevention advocacy. Susan DeFrancesco, Andrea Carlson Gielen, David Bishai, Patricia Mahoney, Shiu Ho, and Bernard Guyer Journal of Health Education — September/October Supplement 2003, Volume 34, No. 5 S—49 American Journal of Health Education — September/October Su plement 2 03, Volume 34, No. 5 S—49 derdeveloped abilities and their lapses in attentiveness. In addition, providing a pedestrian friendly environment could encourage walking, thereby providing additional health benefits to children (CDC, 2002; Rivara & Roberts, in press). Engineering solutions that can reduce the risk of child pedestrian injury include: traffic calming strategies such as speed bumps/humps, street narrowing, and partial/full street closures; well-trained adult crossing guards; pedestrian walk signals timed to provide adequate time for children to cross; “no turn on red” intersections; properly maintained sidewalks; removing sight obstructions such as overgrown foliage and parked cars near intersections; and well-designed raised medians (Zeeger, McMahon, & Burden, in press). But implementing environmental modifications as an injury prevention intervention often is made difficult, if not improbable, largely because of lack of adequate funding, lack of political commitment toward pedestrianfriendly environments, and an institutionalized emphasis on maintaining unimpeded traffic flow at the expense of pedestrian needs (Schieber & Vegega, 2002; Mean Streets, 2000). Therefore, for environmental change to occur, affected communities often need to be involved in advocating for safety improvements (Bergman, Gray, Moffat, Simpson, & Rivara, 2002; Roberts, 1995). Injury prevention professionals also have suggested that committed parents, especially those whose children have suffered an injury, may be quite effective in championing injury prevention interventions (Bergman et al., 2002; McLoughlin & Fennell, 2000). Yet, there have been virtually no empirical studies of parents as advocates for injury prevention. Roberts (1995) conducted a study in New Zealand to determine the willingness of parents to sign a petition calling for child pedestrian safety measures. He found that of the parents studied, 31% signed and returned the petition, although those parents whose children were at lowest risk were those most likely to sign and return it. Parents and other community members’ views about prevention measures that should be taken, their willingness to become engaged in injury prevention interventions, and their opinions as to how to create change in their communities are important for public health professionals to learn. As part of a larger study of child pedestrian safety, we had an opportunity to begin to provide this information from a sample of urban families. With the cooperation of school administrators, teachers, and parents, we undertook a child pedestrian safety needs assessment in four city elementary school neighborhoods that varied by rates of child pedestrian injury and median family income. Both qualitative focus groups and a quantitative survey were used. Aims of this report are to describe parents’ support for child pedestrian safety measures; willingness of parents to pay in terms of volunteer time and money for efforts to make child pedestrian safety improvements in their neighborhood; and parents’ views on how to affect child pedestrian safety improvements in their communities.