Researcher urges shift from measuring harm to promoting child flourishing, offers county-ready data tools
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Summary
Dr. Christina Bethel told symposium attendees that community-level measures and free tools (childhealthdata.org, short-form flourishing metrics) can let counties track protective relationships, school readiness and positive childhood experiences without waiting for new funding or legislation.
Dr. Christina Bethel, founder of the Child and Adolescent Health Measurement Initiative, urged attendees at the Davis Community Resilience Symposium to move "from awareness to action" by using concise, localizable measures that detect not only risks but what she called "flourishing." She said communities can access 2023–24 county- and state-level data and tools at childhealthdata.org to translate research into local programs.
Bethel described a theory of change rooted in lived experience and measurement: build measures that communities can use directly so schools, clinics and local organizations can identify where to act. "We are the medicine," she said, arguing that relational connection — everyday parent–child and teacher–child interactions — is a major protective factor and often more predictive than geography.
Citing national and Utah data included in her slides, Bethel said short-form flourishing metrics capture three observable capacities for youth (self-regulation, persistence and interest/curiosity) and that only a minority meet all three at consistently high levels. She described positive childhood experiences (PCEs) and protective family routines (shared meals, limiting screen time, bedtime routines) as feasible, low-cost targets for population work.
Bethel emphasized practical implementation: free, nonproprietary tools such as the Well Visit Planner and public codebooks allow local teams to collect and analyze data without a PhD. She also described multi-pathway strategies — practice, partnership, policy and measurement — and said many systems changes can be achieved by aligning existing programs, improving data interoperability, and reducing repetitive screening burdens.
When asked during a brief Q&A how parents can signal "you matter" when a child isn’t receptive, Bethel recommended looking for micro-moments (short, repeated interactions that model empathy and recognition) and noted organizers would share slides and resources after the break.
The presentation closed with an emphasis on cross-sector collaboration and readily available tools that attendees can use to measure and promote flourishing in Davis County.