Newman, Mark; Vigurs, Carol; Perry, Amanda; Hallam, Glynn; Schertler, Elizabeth; Johnson, Mathew; Wall, Ruth; (2012) A systematic review of selected interventions to reduce juvenile re-offending. Technical Report. (EPPI-Centre report ). EPPI-Centre, Social Science Research Unit, Institute of Education, University of London: London.

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Abstract

What do we want to know? Persistent juvenile re-offending remains an area of concern for public policy, due to the social, economic and health impacts of such offending on victims and offenders. A large proportion of criminal offences are committed by repeat offenders. The broad purpose of this systematic review was to review the research evidence on a selected range of interventions to reduce re-offending by juveniles to try and identify more effective interventions. What did we find and what are the implications? When compared to standard diversion (caution and monitoring) there was consistent evidence of reductions in re-offending from the following intervention: Pre-sentencing diversion with personal skills training and reparation The intervention included: - personal skills training/ counselling about anger management, personal responsibility and decision making. - some form of reparation to the community/ victim of crime. - family involvement. When compared to standard residential placement there was consistent evidence of reductions in re-offending from the following intervention: • Community based family residential placement for female juvenile offenders The intervention included: - residential placement for six months to a year in small group supportive ‘family type’ environment. - personal skills training/counselling which is about anger management, personal responsibility and decision making. - monitoring and use of appropriate incentives and sanctions. Promising effects The following interventions were classified as having promising positive effects with limited or inconsistent evidence: • ‘Teen Courts’ compared to other diversion • Community based family residential placements compared to standard residential placements for male juvenile offenders Insufficient evidence There was insufficient evidence identified to assess the impact of the following interventions: • Secure incarceration compared to community sentence • Psycho-dynamic counselling compared to normal court interventions • Pre-sentence diversions compared to court community sentence • Multi-component diversion for persistent offenders (comparison not clear) • Multi-component diversion for mixed groups of offence severity (comparison not clear) • Supported transition from secure incarceration to community compared to no or limited support • Probation plus sports counselling compared to probation only • Violence re-education programme compared to court imposed community service What are the implications? The results suggest that those interventions where there is consistent evidence of beneficial effect could be priorities for possible implementation accompanied by rigorous evaluation in the UK context as the evidence on the effects of this intervention in this review all came from the USA. The ‘promising’ interventions could be considered priorities for further rigorous evaluation. How did we get these results? The review was undertaken in a number of stages. The first stage consisted of identifying all studies that met the review inclusion criteria published between 1998 and 2007. Descriptive information about these studies was collected and used as a ‘map’ of research in the field of interventions to reduce juvenile re-offending. At this point there were 94 studies included the map. A further round of coding was undertaken to help identify sub-groups of studies. The results of this coding were discussed with the steering group and a decision was made at that point to focus on a number of subgroups for the in-depth review. At this stage detailed data extraction was undertaken to assess the quality of the studies and facilitate synthesis of the findings of the selected studies in order to provide answers to the review questions.

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