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Abstract

Juvenile justice systems make use of many programs intended to reduce the recidivism of the juvenile offenders with whom they interact. Not all such programs are effective and one of the more progressive reforms of recent years has been the movement toward programs validated by research evidence. Three ways to define evidence-based programs are described, with a focus on a relatively unfamiliar approach—evidence from meta-analysis of evaluation research that supports the effectiveness of many generic types of programs. In contrast to the prevailing model program approach, this approach makes use of evidence that supports the effectiveness of many of the homegrown and local programs that juvenile justice systems use. The findings of a large meta-analysis of hundreds of studies reveal that many of these more generic programs are as effective as comparable model programs. These findings have been operationalized into a rating scheme based on the characteristics of effective interventions that can be used by service providers and juvenile justice systems to assess their programs. Two recidivism studies provide promising indications of the validity of this scheme for identifying effective programs and guiding improvement for ineffective ones. The results of this work show that the large body of research on interventions with juvenile offenders can be used to create guidelines that extend the concept of evidence-based programs to the kinds of generic programs most commonly used in juvenile justice systems.

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Research-Based Guidelines for Juvenile Justice Programs

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