Publications
Jensen, S. Placencio-Castro, M., Murray, S. Littman, J., Sezibera, V., Betancourt, T. (Under Review). Long-term sustainment of the effects of early childhood intervention: A four-year follow-up to the Sugira Muryango parenting intervention in Rwanda. BMJ Global Health
Bond, L., Placencio-Castro, M., Byansi, W., Puffer, E., Betancourt, T. (Under Review). Association of Quality of Delivery and Intervention Outcomes within a Home-Visiting Intervention. Implementation Sciences.
Bond, L., Placencio-Castro, M., Byansi, W., Puffer, E., Betancourt, T. (Under Review). Factors Associated with Nonspecialist Quality of Delivery within a Family Strengthening Intervention in Rwanda: A Parallel Latent Growth Model. Prevention Science.
Black, C., Placencio-Castro, M., Phend, G., Havugimana, J., Umulisa, G., Jensen, S., Rawlings, L., Sezibera, V., & Betancourt T., (Under Review). Scaling Up Home-Visiting to Promote Early Childhood Development and Prevent Violence in Rwanda: An Embedded Hybrid Type-II Effectiveness-Implementation Trial, The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.
Placencio-Castro, M., Phend, G., Bond, L., Vianney, JM., Jensen, S., Farrar, J., Kajani, U., Sezibera, V., & Betancourt, T. (Under Review). The PLAY Collaborative -Scaling-Out an Evidence-Based Early Childhood Development and Violence Prevention Home-Visiting Program in Rwanda: Hybrid Type-2 Effectiveness-Implementation Study Protocol. Frontiers in Public Health.
Jung, E., Black, C,. Placencio-Castro, M, Chamlagai, L., Osman, R., Hoffman, M., Beardslee, W., Betancourt, T. (Under Review). Delivering a Family-Based Child Mental Health Promotion Program among Two Resettled Refugee Communities During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Lessons Learned in a Hybrid Type II Implementation-Effectiveness Randomized Control Trial. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.
Freeman, J., Farrar, J., Placencio-Castro, M., Desrosiers, A., Brennan, R., Feika, M., Jambia, M., Hansen, N., Akinsulure- Smith, A., Su, S., Bangura, J., & Betancourt, T. (2023). Integrating Youth Readiness Intervention and Entrepreneurship in Sierra Leone: A Hybrid Type II CRT. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0890856723022542
Desmond, C., Grace Watt, K., Jensen, SK., Simmons, E., Murray, S.M., Farrar, J., Placencio-Castro, M., Sezibera, V., Rawlings, L., Wilson, B., Betancourt, T. (2023). Measuring the cost-effectiveness of a home-visiting intervention to promote early child development among families linked to the Rwandan Social Protection System. PLOS Global Public Health. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgph.0002473
Jensen, S. K., Murray, S., Placencio-Castro, M.; Kajani, U., Amponsah, D., Sezibera, V., & Betancourt, T. (2023). Family Violence Reduction Within a Parenting Intervention in Rwanda: A Mixed-Methods Study. Pediatrics, 151, S2, May 2023. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2023-060221L
McKay, A., Placencio-Castro, M., Kelly-Weeder, S. & Harris, A. (2023). Development and psychometric testing of a scale to measure sexual minority-inclusivity in sex education (SMISES), Sexuality Research and Social Policy. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13178-023-00794-3
Mendive, S., Placencio-Castro, M., Strasser, K., Dominguez, P., Pozo, F., Kucirkova, N. (2023). Impacts of a Personalized Book Giveaway Intervention in low-SES Households, Early Childhood Research Quarterly 63:169–80. doi: 10.1016/j.ecresq.2022.12.008.
McKay, E. A., Placencio-Castro, M., Fu, M., & Fontenot, H. (2021). Associations between Sex Education Types and Sexual Behaviors Among Female Adolescents: A Secondary Data Analysis of the National Survey of Family Growth 2011-2019, Sexuality Research and Social Policy. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13178-021-00664-w
Maru, M., Rogers, E. S., Nicolellis, D., Legere, L., Placencio-Castro, M., Magee, C., & Harbaugh, A. G. (2021). Vocational peer support for adults with psychiatric disabilities: Results of a randomized trial. Psychiatric Rehabilitation Journal. https://doi.org/10.1037/prj0000484.
Jensen SK, Placencio-Castro M, Murray SM, et al (2021) Effect of a home-visiting parenting program to promote early childhood development and prevent violence: a cluster-randomized trial in Rwanda. BMJ Global Health 2021;6:e003508.
Ludlow LH, Placencio-Castro, M., & Scanlan, M. (2020). Characterizing change within a two-way immersion network of schools promoting bilingual education: A social network analysis. The International Journal of Diversity in Education, 20(1), 11-34. https://doi.org/10.18848/2327-0020/CGP/v20i01/11-34.
Scanlan, M., Melley, K.,Placencio-Castro, M., & Ludlow, L. (2019). Transforming Communities of Practice Through Networks. In Scanlan, M., Hunter, C., & Howard, E., (Eds.). Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Education: Designing Networks That Transform Schools, Harvard Education Press, Boston, MA.
Ongoing Projects
Placencio-Castro, M. Psychometric Properties and Measurement Invariance of the DERS-18 Scale in Rwanda: A Validation Study.
Placencio-Castro, M. Validation of the Infant/Toddler HOME Inventory in Rwanda: Dimensionality, Item Calibration, and Differential Item Functioning.
Placencio-Castro, M. (Doctoral Dissertation Paper). The relationship between Maternal Mental Health, Nurturing Care Practices, and Child Development: Evidence from a Cluster Randomized Trial in Rural Rwanda.
Van Den Boom, W., Menart, R., Placencio-Castro, M., Mac-Boima, E., Hansen, N., Esliker, R., Betancourt, T., (In Preparation) Youth Readiness Intervention Integrated into Entrepreneurship Programs Serving War-affected Youth in Sierra Leone: Findings from a 4-year Follow-up Study.
Presentations
2023 - Speaker - AcademyHealth Annual Research Meeting, Seattle, WA.
Presentation: Effectiveness of Integrating a Transdiagnostic Group Mental Health Intervention for Youth into Entrepreneurship Programs Using a Collaborative Team Approach: A Hybrid Type II Effectiveness-Implementation Cluster Randomized Control Trial in Sierra Leone.
Presentation: Testing an Implementation Science Strategy to Expand Reach and Quality of Home-Visiting to Promote Early Childhood Development and Prevent Violence in Rwanda: A Hybrid Type II Implementation-Effectiveness Trial.
Poster: Study of Long-Term and Household Spillover Effects of a Parenting and ECD Intervention on Children and Families Living in Extreme Poverty in Rwanda.
2023 - Co-author - International Congress on Evidence-Based Parenting Support, On-line.
Presentation: Sugira Muryango Implementation Strategy - The PLAY Collaborative
Presentation: Sugira Muryango Quasi-Experimental Study - Initial Results in Children 0-2 embedded in the PLAY Collaborative Project
2022 - Presenter - International Congress of Infant Studies, Ottawa, Canada.
Poster: Mechanistic effects of a Family Strengthening Intervention on early child outcomes in Rwanda.
Poster: Longitudinal study of the effects of early life parenting intervention on enrolled children and their siblings in Rwanda.
2022 - Speaker - International Seminar: Investigación en Educación y Salud con Impacto Público, Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, Santiago, Chile.
The Sugira Muryango Family Strengthening Intervention: Promoting Early Childhood Development through Playful Parenting, Father Engagement, and Violence Reduction.
2022 - Instructor - School of Education, Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, Santiago, Chile.
Workshop: Desarrollo, Validación y Análisis de Instrumentos Psicométricos
2021 - Instructor - Universidad Diego Portales, Open Methodological Workshop Series.
Workshop: Psicometría: Teoría y Aplicaciones [Psychometrics: Theory and Applications].
2021 - Instructor - UNESCO, Latin American Laboratory for Assessment of the Quality of Education (LLECE)
4-sessions On-line Workshop: El desafío de medir atributos no observables: tópicos de medición psicológica y educativa [The challenge of measuring unobservable attributes: Topics in psychological and educational measurement].
2021 - Speaker - Society for Research in Child Development 2021 Virtual Biennal Meeting.
Measuring Parenting in Sub-Saharan Africa: HOME Inventory dimensionality assessment, IRT calibration, and scale validation,
2020 - Speaker - Academic Seminar at the Center for Economic and Social Policies (CEAS), Universidad Mayor. Chile.
Promoting early childhood development and preventing home violence: Results from a cluster-randomized trial linked to a social protection program in Rwanda.
2019 - Speaker - Latin American Studies Association Annual Conference (LASA), Boston, Massachusetts.
Citizenship Education and Learning Achievement in Chile: The Relationship between Students’ democratic attitudes, practices, and academic achievement.
2019 - Speaker - New England Educational Research Organization Annual Conference, Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
A Rasch Approach to Measuring Students’ Future Political Engagement: Insights from ICCS 2016.
2019 - Instructor - Boston College, Lynch School of Education and Human Development.
Workshop: Introduction to Applied Statistics using Stata.
2018 - Speaker - Northeastern Educational Research Association Annual Conference, Trumbull, Connecticut.
Learning Together: Characterizing change within a Two-Way Immersion Network of Schools promoting bilingual education.
2015 - Speaker - XXX Latin American Sociological Association Congress, University of Costa Rica. San José, Costa Rica.
Legitimidad del Sistema Económico y Participación Ciudadana: Aproximación a la relación entre percepciones individuales y actividad política en Chile.