Stress Intervention Trials for Immigrant Parents in the United States: A Scoping Review

Immigrant parents in the US face unique challenges related to immigration policy and structural inequities. Although stress interventions exist for parents in general, little is known about those targeting US immigrant parents. This scoping review aimed to map the intervention and participant characteristics of stress intervention trials targeting US immigrant parents. The JBI conduct standards, the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews, and the Population, Concept, and Context framework guided the review. A comprehensive literature search was conducted across APA PsycINFO, PsycARTICLES, CINAHL Plus, ERIC, Embase, MEDLINE, the International Bibliography of Social Sciences, and the Cochrane Library. Peer-reviewed, English-language articles were included without date limits. Five independent reviewers screened studies and extracted data. Of 7,989 records screened, 13 trials were included. Most trials were pilot or feasibility studies (62%) and employed randomized controlled trial designs (62%), with 69% published in the past decade. Interventions primarily focused on stress management or reduction (85%) and were largely adapted from existing programs (92%); all (100%) utilized language adaptations, but only half (50%) incorporated immigrant-specific experiences. Target populations were predominantly Latino/Hispanic parents (69%). Interventions were most often delivered in community (46%) or home (31%) settings, using in-person group formats (69%), commonly combining social support (92%) with parenting skill development (85%). Stress outcomes most frequently assessed parenting stress (69%) or general stress (31%), while immigration-related stress was infrequently measured (15%). Although most trials (77%) used stress measures validated in populations sharing the same racial, cultural, or ethnic background, only four studies (31%) employed tools validated in US immigrant samples. Among the 11 trials reporting group-level outcomes, six (55%) reported improvements. Slightly more than half of the trials enrolled 50 or fewer participants (61%) and primarily involved parents with a mean age between 30 and 39 years (62%). Many trials involved parents of children with a mean age in the preschool-kindergarten (23%) and elementary school (46%) ranges. Over two-thirds of trials (77%) reported participation of parents with low education. While female parents were reported in all trials, fathers' participation was reported in fewer than half of studies (46%). Among these, no trials reported samples with ≥ 50% fathers, and only two reported ≥ 25% fathers. No trials reported participation of non-biological or non-residential parents. Despite the heightened stress faced by US immigrant parents, few targeted intervention trials have been published. Key gaps in the existing literature include reliance on adapted interventions that emphasize social support and parenting skills, limited use of stress measures validated for US immigrant parent populations, and underrepresentation of diverse immigrant groups. Future research should broaden populations and settings, diversify intervention strategies, and assess immigration-related stress and stressors using validated measures.