A Sleep Intervention for Preschoolers in Foster Care

Healthy sleep is critical for optimal health and development, but there are no public health interventions to support sleep for children in foster care. This proposal will develop and implement a digital public-health-level intervention to support foster caregivers in promoting healthy sleep in the young children in their care. The digital intervention approach has the potential to maximize scalability and reach to support foster children and their caregivers on a national level.

Inclusion Criteria: * Participants are only recruited for Aims 2 (Nurturing Sleep pretest) and 3 (RCT of Nurturing Sleep) of the study and must be a US foster parent of a preschool aged child (36 to 71 months) and have a smartphone. Foster parents will be adults 21 years of age or older, per federal requirements for foster parent licensing. Exclusion Criteria: * Participants will be excluded from the study if they are not English or Spanish speaking, or if the child they are to report on has a serious medical condition or developmental disability that the sleep intervention would not be appropriate for because their medical condition requires more specialized strategies (e.g., cerebral palsy, seizures, autism spectrum disorders). If there is more than one preschool aged child under the foster parent's care, they will implement the intervention and answer study questionnaires based on the child for whom they are most concerned about their sleep.