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Abstract
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For more information on Achievement Place, see VioPro record number 3524.
OBJECTIVE:
The purpose of this study by Kirigin et al. was to assess the effectiveness of Teacher-Family group home treatment programs for juvenile offenders.
METHODOLOGY:
This study was quasi-experimental. The Achievement Place project developed and evaluated a community-based, behavioral intervention program for the treatment of juvenile offenders. Its goal was to develop humane, effective, and practical treatment procedures that could be replicated by group home programs in other communities. The group homes selected for this evaluation consisted of the original Achievement Place program directed by Lonnie and Elaine Phillips, 12 later replications, and nine conventional community-based residential programs in Kansas. The selection of the sample was not random. The Teaching-Family and the comparison programs appeared to be similar on several dimensions. Each program served six to eight court-adjudicated youths between 12 and 16 years of age and was staffed by live-in, married, houseparent couples. None of the programs admitted youths who committed violent crimes, such as murder, rape or armed robbery. The 13 Teaching-Family programs in this study were implemented within seven group homes, and the nine comparison programs were implemented in four group homes and one larger residential facility. Of the 13 Teaching-Family programs, nine served boys and four served girls. Of the nine comparison programs, four served boys and five served girls.
The youths court and police records provided the primary sources for outcome measures. Trained evaluation assistants reviewed each youths records and retrieved information specific to the number and nature of any reported alleged offenses, and any occurrence of institutional commitment. Reported alleged offenses included any illegal behavior or act recorded in a youths court or police files regardless of whether formal action was taken. Alleged offenses included criminal offenses such as burglary, theft, and vandalism. Average offense rates per month for the year preceding treatment, and for the first year following treatment were computed for both Teacher-Family and non-Teacher-Family programs. Also, institutional confinement was determined from commitment documents contained in the court records.
Reliability assessments were obtained on the information retrieved from the youth's police and court files by having a second evaluation assistant independently review a random sample of files. For each group home program, at least 20% of the files were reviewed to assess the reliability of measurement procedures. Occurrence reliability was obtained by comparing the two observer's records for agreement on the occurrence of an event.
FINDINGS/DISCUSSION:
Two sets of analyses considered boys' and girls' programs separately across pre-, during, and posttreatment periods. In the first of these analyses, the dependent measure was the percentage of youths with any recorded offense. In the second set, the dependent measure was average offense rate.
The Teaching-Family and non-Teaching-Family programs for boys were quite comparable in the pretreatment years. However, there were marked differences during treatment. For the girls' programs in the pretreatment year, there was a slightly higher and statistically significant percentage of Teaching-Family program youth who had offenses reported. However, during treatment, fewer Teaching-Family girls were involved in offenses. In the posttreatment year, the Teaching-Family programs for boys and for girls also showed lower percentages of youths involved in offenses. The posttreatment differences, however, were not statistically significant.
To determine the impact of the group homes on criminal offense rates, boys' and girls' programs were analyzed separately. Comparisons of offense rates during and post treatment were carried out using a multiple analysis of variance computer program. Thus, programs with few youths were weighted less in the analysis than programs with many youths. In these analyses, the during and posttreatment offense rates were treated as separate response variables. Criminal offense rates and noncriminal offense rates were analyzed separately. Exploratory analysis of the offense data indicated that assumptions of normality were not seriously violated. Covariates were added in subsequent analyses to adjust for pretreatment variables that were significantly related to the during and posttreatment outcomes.
For boys, in the pretreatment years, Teaching-Family programs averaged 2.8 criminal offenses per month while comparison programs averaged 1.6 criminal offenses. However, these differences were not statistically significant. During treatment, mean criminal offense rates for the Teaching-Family boys programs decreased to 1.3 (a 54% reduction from pretreatment levels). The pattern of decreases in criminal offenses from pre- to during treatment was representative of seven of the nine Teaching-Family programs. In contrast, mean criminal offense rates during treatment for non-Teaching-Family boys programs showed an increase from 1.6 to 2.9. In the post-treatment year, criminal offense rates for Teaching-Family and non-Teaching-Family boys programs averaged 1.5 and 1.6, respectively.
For girls, rates of criminal offenses were considerably lower than corresponding rates for the boys' programs. Offense rates for Teaching-Family girls' programs decreased from .65 offenses in the pretreatment year to .37 during treatment. In contrast, four of the five comparison girls' programs showed increases from the pre- to during treatment.
AUTHORS' RECOMMENDATIONS:
The authors suggested that further research be employed concerning the National Teacher-Family Association. They contended that the program's effectiveness could be improved in Kansas as well as at other sites for preventing juvenile delinquency.
(CSPV Abstract - Copyright © 1992-2007 by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, Institute of Behavioral Science, Regents of the University of Colorado)
Kansas
Juvenile Offender
Residential Treatment
Treatment Program
Program Effectiveness
Program Evaluation
Group Treatment
Intervention Program
Community Based
Offender Treatment
Cognitive Behavioral Intervention
Cognitive Behavioral Treatment
Juvenile Delinquency
Juvenile Treatment
Delinquency Intervention
Delinquency Treatment
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