MERTIL for Parents
Pilot Study of an Attachment and Trauma-Informed Online Parenting Program
Authors: Zoe C. G. Cloud, Jessica E. Opie, Nicole Paterson, Anne-Marie Maxwell, Anna T. Booth, Holly Foster, Ellen T. Welsh, Tanudja Gibson, Shikkiah de Quadros-Wander and Jennifer E. McIntosh
Published by: Children
Citation: Cloud, Z. C., Welsh, E. T., Hepworth, D., McIntosh, J. E., & Barrington, N. (2026). Refining a Single Session Thinking Approach for Trauma-Affected Families: A Delphi Study. Contemporary Family Therapy, 1-13.
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This research is useful for parents and carers of young children, and practitioners working with young families. It is also relevant for service and policy decision-makers designing systems to support early family relationships.
MERTIL (My Early Relational Trauma-Informed Learning) for Parents is a short, online parenting program designed to support parents to build trust, confidence and connection with their young children aged 0-5 years. MERTIL for Parents offers an alternative to existing parenting programs that can be difficult to access in person, long or intensive, targeted at families in crisis, or focused on behaviour management rather than relational approaches. MERTIL for Parents is brief (40 minutes), consisting of 4 short, animated video modules that covers attachment-based parenting content including the concepts of trust and trauma, and rupture and repair. The program also offers complementary downloadable resources.
A pilot study of MERTIL for Parents explored whether parents found the program acceptable, and whether it was effective in the short term.
Seventy-nine Australian parents or carers of children aged 0–5 years consented to program participation after a referral from their maternal and child health nurse.
Data was collected through short surveys, completed by consenting parents at three time points:
- before completing the program
- immediately after finishing the program,
- and three months later.
Twenty-five parents completed all three surveys in addition to the program.
Overall, parents responded very positively to MERTIL for Parents. Findings suggest the program was acceptable to parents from diverse backgrounds and could support meaningful improvements in parents’ confidence, help-seeking behaviour, and relationship quality.
Key study findings from parents who engaged with the program included:
- 98% reported the program was useful
- 92% reported the length was appropriate
- 100% were willing to recommend it to other parents
Engagement and satisfaction were similar across different backgrounds and psychosocial characteristics (e.g., trauma history, mood symptoms).
Parents reported positive short-terms changes three months after completing the program, including:
- feeling more confident in their parenting,
- more comfortable seeking help if they needed support.
- more attuned to their child’s needs,
- greater enjoyment in their relationship with their child,
- less irritability toward their child,
- more comfortable seeking help if they needed support.
MERTIL for Parents shows promise as a scalable, low barrier program that supports relational health of families of young children.
The findings suggest that a brief, self-directed online program can make a meaningful difference to how parents feel about themselves and their relationships with their children and can support increased help-seeking behaviour.
The program may function as a universal early intervention option that complements more intensive support for families.
Further research on long-term outcomes and broader implementation across diverse family and service contexts will extend this evidence-base.
- Test and evaluate the adapted SST session map in real clinical settings,
- Include perspectives of families to refine the approach,
- Consider how the adaptions could be translated to diverse service environments (e.g., different organisational settings, shorter initial sessions),
- Use trauma-informed family-centred outcome measures to meaningful evaluate the adapted SST’s impact on individual and relational functioning over time,
- Continue development of training, supervision, and support for practitioners applying trauma-adapted SST in high-demand settings to embed guidelines into routine practice.