In the absence of large-scale investments of public resources, families in many communities are faced with making early care and education (ECE) decisions within a set of limited options. There is a need to better understand how families make decisions in these environments, the factors that influence their decisions, the information they need and how specific program or community characteristics may play a role in their decisions. This study used a mixed methods approach, integrating administrative, survey and qualitative interview data to provide an in-depth look at family decision-making and access to ECE within one community. We found that families were using multiple types of ECE arrangements for their children. Families considered many factors and engaged in multiple activities. These factors and activities included informal networks and formal local resources, often used simultaneously to garner access to the ECE situations needed. Complicating the decision-making context is that decisions about care change over time, and across children in families with more than one child. In addition, families found accessing information to make their decisions challenging, time consuming, and that universal information was limited. These findings have implications for policy and practice as well as for how the field continues to study ECE access and decision-making. We found that all three data sources alone provided insights, each with their own benefits and limitations. However, deep understanding of a family's ECE decision-making over time and across the family was only gained through multiple data sources and with important insights gleaned through in-depth qualitative interviews. Future research can consider different combinations of methods to use to study ECE decision-making while weighing what is gained and lost when different methods are used.

中文翻译：

---

缺少什么？更全面地了解早期护理和教育决策的多方法方法


在没有大规模公共资源投资的情况下，许多社区的家庭面临着在一系列有限的选择中做出早期护理和教育 （ECE） 决定的问题。有必要更好地了解家庭如何在这些环境中做出决策、影响他们决策的因素、他们需要的信息以及特定的计划或社区特征如何在他们的决策中发挥作用。本研究采用混合方法，整合行政、调查和定性访谈数据，以深入了解一个社区内的家庭决策和获得 ECE 的机会。我们发现，家庭正在为他们的孩子使用多种类型的 ECE 安排。家庭考虑了许多因素并参与了多种活动。这些因素和活动包括非正式网络和正式的当地资源，通常同时使用以获得所需的 ECE 情况。使决策环境复杂化的是，关于护理的决定会随着时间的推移而变化，并且在有多个孩子的家庭中，会因孩子而异。此外，家庭发现获取信息以做出决策具有挑战性、耗时，而且通用信息有限。这些发现对政策和实践以及该领域如何继续研究 ECE 的获取和决策具有影响。我们发现，仅这三个数据源就提供了见解，每个数据源都有自己的优点和局限性。然而，只有通过多个数据源和深入的定性访谈收集到重要的见解，才能深入了解家庭随时间和整个家庭的 ECE 决策。 未来的研究可以考虑使用不同的方法组合来研究 ECE 决策，同时权衡使用不同方法时的得失。