NCJ Number
79869
Journal
Corrective and Social Psychiatry and Journal of Behavior Technology Methods and Therapy Volume: 27 Issue: 3 Dated: (1981) Pages: 130-134
Date Published
1981
Length
5 pages
Annotation
An evaluation of a Michigan program based on the 'Scared Straight' model for preventing juvenile delinquency is critically examined to support the contention that outcome evaluations should be used to modify rather than to cancel programs.
Abstract
Michigan's Juvenile Offenders Learn Truth (JOLT) program involved exposure of juvenile offenders to an intensive confrontation with adult offenders at an adult prison. Evaluation of the program, like other evaluations of Scared Straight programs, showed that JOLT participants and control group members had similar recidivism rates at 3 months and 6 months after the program. As a result of the evaluation, Michigan's Department of Corrections advocated the termination of the program. However, favorable media attention to the program led the State legislature's House Corrections Committee to call public hearings on the issue. Among methodological problems with the evaluation were possible biases in the selection of the experimental and control groups and the small numbers of subjects involved in the 6-month followup. Other problems included the short length of the followup, the exclusive focus on recidivism as a criterion of program effectiveness, and the lack of attention to the program's benefits to the adult offenders who were involved in the program. Program proponents also noted that the program appeared to have no harmful effects and involved virtually no cost to the Department of Corrections. Rokeach's research showing that cognitive changes occur well before behavioral change supports the contention that the followup period was too short. Thus, the Department of Corrections should have used the evaluation findings as the basis for modifying the program and for gathering additional data rather than for trying to eliminate it. In fact, the public hearing did result in the program's reinstatement and modification. Ten references are listed.