Compendium 2000 on Effective Correctional Programming

Editors
LAURENCE L. MOTIUK
RALPH C. SERIN

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COMPENDIUM ADVISORY BOARD

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

CONTRIBUTORS

INTRODUCTION

PART ONE CONTRIBUTING TO EFFECTIVE CORRECTIONAL PROGRAMS

1. Defining Correctional Programs
James McGuire

2. Principles of Effective Correctional Programs
Donald A. Andrews

3. The Effects of Community Sanctions and Incarceration on Recidivism
Paul Gendreau, Claire Goggin, Francis T. Cullen, and Donald A. Andrews

4. Offender Assessment: General Issues and Considerations
James Bonta

5. Treatment Responsivity: Reducing Recidivism by Enhancing Treatment Effectiveness
Sharon M. Kennedy

6. Obstacles to Effective Correctional Program Delivery
Paul Gendreau, Claire Goggin, and Paula Smith

7. Implementation of Effective Correctional Programs
Alan W. Leschied

8. Addressing Treatment Resistance in Corrections
Denise L. Preston

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PART TWO CORRECTIONAL PROGRAMS AND INTERVENTIONS

9. Education Programming for Offenders
Dennis J. Stevens

10. Offender Employment Programming
Christa A. Gillis

11. Treatment and Intervention Approaches with Families
Claudio Violato, Mark Genuis, and Elizabeth Oddone-Paolucci

12. Informing Young Offender’s Policy in Current Research: What the Future Holds
Alan W. Leschied

13. Treatment of Family Violence in Correctional Settings
Lynn Stewart, Jim Hill, and Janice Cripps

14. Programming for Offenders with Substance Abuse and Dependence Problems
Lynn O. Lightfoot

15. Problems of Self-Regulation among Adult Offenders
Lynn Stewart and Rob Rowe

16. Treatment Approaches for Offenders with Mental Disorder
James McGuire

17. The Assessment and Treatment of Sexual Offenders
William L. Marshall and Sharon Williams

18. Violent Offender Programming
Ralph C. Serin and Denise L. Preston

19. Programming for Aboriginal Offenders
Joseph E. Couture

20. Effective Correctional Practice with Women Offenders
Kelley Blanchette

21. The Role of Staff in Effective Program Delivery
Claude Tellier and Ralph C. Serin

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PART THREE EVALUATION

22. Program Evaluation: Guidelines for Asking the Right Questions
Gerry Gaes

23. Contributing to Safe Reintegration: Outcome Measurement
Laurence L. Motiuk

24. Program Evaluation: Intermediate Measures of Treatment Success
Ralph C. Serin

25. Cumulating Knowledge:How Meta-Analysis can Serve the Needs of Correctional Clinicians and Policy-Makers
Paul Gendreau, Claire Goggin, and Paula Smith

26. Development of a Program Logic Model to Assist Evaluation
James McGuire

27. Cost-Effective Correctional Treatment
Shelley L. Brown

 

Compendium Advisory Board

DONALD A. ANDREWS, Ph.D.
Department of Psychology
Carleton University
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

KELLEY BLANCHETTE, M.A.
Research Branch
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

JAMES L. BONTA, Ph.D.
Department of the Solicitor General
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

JOSEPH COUTURE, Ph.D.
Athabaska University
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

NICOLA EPPRECHT, M.A.
Research Branch
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

PAUL GENDREAU, Ph.D.
Centre for Criminal Justice Studies
University of New Brunswick
St. John, New Brunswick, Canada

ALAN LEISCHIED, Ph.D.
University of Western Ontario
London, Ontario, Canada

DOUGLAS LIPTON, Ph.D.
National Development Research Institute
New York, NY
United States of America

FRIEDRICH LÖSEL, Ph.D.
Universtat Erlangen-Nürnberg
Erlangen, Germany

JAMES McGUIRE, Ph.D.
University of Liverpool
Liverpool, England

LAURENCE L. MOTIUK, Ph.D.
Research Branch
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

RALPH C. SERIN, Ph.D.
Research Branch
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

Acknowledgements

The editors are deeply indebted to many individuals and organizations for the advice and assistance provided during the preparation of this Compendium. We are particularly grateful to the many staff of the federal, provincial and territorial correctional departments across Canada, their respective administrators and program deliverers, and to others for providing background material; completing surveys; replying to letters; providing clarification and details; and reviewing and commenting on the various parts of the Compendium.

We are very grateful to Ole Ingstrup, former Commissioner of the Correctional Service of Canada, who gave us the wherewithal to begin the research, and to Lucie McClung, current Commissioner, who continued to support the project and see it through to completion. The Government of Canada provided the bulk of the funding for this Compendium. We would also like to thank the following persons for their support and input to the project: Don Demers (British Columbia), Arnold Galet (Alberta), Don Head (Saskatchewan), Greg Graceffo (Manitoba), John Rabeau, and Morris Zbar (Ontario), Louise Pagé (Quebec), Michel Thériault (New Brunswick), Fred Honsberger (Nova Scotia), David O'Brien (Prince Edward Island), Marvin McNutt (Newfoundland), Sharon Hickey (Yukon), John Dillon (Northwest Territories), and Ron McCormick (Territory of Nunavut).

We would also like to thank Herrera Berman Communications for the cover design, Josée Wan-Kam and Sherri McDaniel from Acart Communications for typesetting, and layout services, Translation Services of the Correctional Service of Canada, National Printers for printing, and Cathy Delnef (Le Bon Mot) for editorial services in English and French and adaptation of a mass of contributions. Undoubtedly, we owe many thanks to Cathy for her steadfast and quality assistance throughout the duration of this project. Also, we need to thank the staff of the Research Branch. In particular, Tina Bada, Diane Charron, Colette Cousineau, Nicola Epprecht, Jeffrey Franson, Dean Jones, Joe Mileto, and Kim Vance. Then, there is the staff of the Intergovernmental Affairs Branch who helped to co-ordinate our research efforts with the provinces and territories. Finally, it is important for us to emphasize that this Compendium would not have been possible without the incredible quality of work provided by an exceptional cross-section of contributors.

Contributors

Donald A. Andrews, Ph.D.
Carleton University
Ottawa, Ontario

Kelley Blanchette, M.A.
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

James Bonta, Ph.D.
Solicitor General Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

Shelley L. Brown, M.A.
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

Joseph E. Couture, Ph.D.
Athabasca University
Athabasca, Alberta

Janice Cripps, M.A.
Correctional Service of Canada
Toronto, Ontario

Francis T. Cullen, Ph.D.
University of Cincinnati
Cincinnati, Ohio

Gerry Gaes, Ph.D.
Federal Bureau of Prisons
Washington, District of Columbia

Paul Gendreau, Ph.D.
University of New Brunswick
Saint John, New Brunswick

Mark Genuis, Ph.D.
National Foundation for Family Research and Education
Calgary, Alberta

Christa A. Gillis, M.A.
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

Claire Goggin, M.A.
University of New Brunswick
Saint John, New Brunswick

Jim Hill, Ph.D.
Correctional Service Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

Sharon M. Kennedy, Ph.D.
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

Alan W. Leschied, Ph.D.
University of Western Ontario
London, Ontario

Lynn O. Lightfoot, Ph.D.
University of Western Ontario
London, Ontario

William L. Marshall, Ph.D.
Queen's University
Kingston, Ontario

James McGuire, Ph.D.
University of Liverpool
Liverpool, United Kingdom

Laurence L. Motiuk, Ph.D.
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

Elizabeth Odonne-Paolucci, Ph.D.
National Foundation for Family Research and Education
Calgary, Alberta

Denise L. Preston, Ph.D.
Correctional Service of Canada
Kingston, Ontario

Rob Rowe, M.A.
Carleton University
Ottawa, Ontario

Ralph C. Serin, Ph.D.
Correctional Service of Canada
Kingston, Ontario

Paula Smith, B.A.
University of New Brunswick
Saint John, New Brunswick

Dennis J. Stevens, Ph.D.
University of Massachusetts
Quincy, Massachusetts

Lynn Stewart, Ph.D.
Correctional Service Canada
Toronto, Ontario

Claude Tellier, M.A.
Correctional Service of Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

Claudio Violato, Ph.D.
National Foundation for Family Research and Education
Calgary, Alberta

Sharon Williams, Ph.D.
Correctional Service Canada
Ottawa, Ontario

 

Introduction

LAURENCE L. MOTIUK¹

In Canada, the number of provincial/ territorial prison-admissions had increased by 22.5% between 1990-91 and 1992-93 from 207,946 to 245,746. Similarly, federal admissions increased 21.4% between 1990-91 and 1993-94 (peaking one year later than provinces/territories) from 4,646 to to 5,642. The increase in admissions contributed in large measure to the rapid growth of the Canadian federal/provincial/territorial prison population in the early 1990s. Moreover, the total actual-in prison population rose by 16% between 1990-91 and 1994-95 from 29,224 to 33,882.²

Because of this growth in the prison population, the Federal/Provincial/Territorial Ministers responsible for Justice asked Deputy Ministers and Heads of Corrections to identify options to deal effectively with growing prison populations. A paper entitled Corrections Population Growth was subsequently developed and presented to the Ministers in May 1996. An additional recommendation made in the First Report on Progress³ was “sharing research findings on offender programe effectiveness”. This recommendation inspired the formation of an expert advisory group to design and develop a Compendium on Effective Correctional Programming. This introduction provides the backgroud and framework for this work.

Background

The Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) was requested by the Federal/ Provincial/Territorial Heads of Corrections to convene an advisory group of international experts on effective correctional programming and develop a framework for a compendium on “what works” in offender programming”. Subsequently, the Research Branch of CSC was approached to undertake a comprehensive review of the literature on effective correctional programs and evaluation methods. Accordingly, a leadership role was taken in assembling an expert advisory group, designing a compendium framework, compiling relevant program information and surveying best practices across the various jurisdictions in Canada.

The expert advisory group

To create an expert advisory group, CSC identified and contracted with a number of well-known researchers/evaluators in the filed of effective correctional programming. From Canada, there was Don Andrews (Carleton University), Paul Gendreau (University of New Brunswick), Alan Leschied (University of Western Ontario), and Joseph Couture (Athabasca University). From the United Kingdom, there was James McGuire (University of Liverpool). From Germany, Freidrick Lösel (Universtat Erlangen-Nurnberg) and from the United States, Douglas Lipton (National Development and Research Institute). In conjunction with CSC Research Branch staff (Larry Motiuk, and Ralph Serin), these individuals comprised the expert advisory group tasked with drafting a framework for a compendium on “what works” in offender programming.

The framework

For the expert advisory group, potential impacts of the Compendium were seen as the following: meeting the needs of multiple users, from practitioners to administrators; sharing best practices among various jurisdictions; providing reasonable measures of evaluating program effectiveness, and, where possible, make recommendations regarding specific tools or instruments to assist staff in this regard; developing innovations in correctional programming; conducting ongoing research into program effectiveness; and enabling different jurisdictions to embrace technology transfer.

In March 1998, a second meeting of the advisory group was held to finalize the Compendium framework that had arose from earlier discussions. At this meeting, some new members joined the advisory group. They included Jim Bonta (Department of the Solicitor General), Nicola Epprecht (Correctional Service of Canada), and Kelley Blanchette (Correctional Service of Canada). Following that meeting, the framework for a compendium of “what works” in offender programming was finalized and presented to the Federal/Provincial/Territorial Heads of Corrections for approval in May 1998. Consequently, the task of compiling a five part Compendium 2000 on Effective Correctional Programming was approved to move forward. While a massive research undertaking ensued, the sheer magnitude of it is beyond the scope of this introduction. However, an overview of the basic content of the two volumes is provided here.

Volume 1
Part One.	Contributing to Effective Correctional Programs
Part Two.	Correctional Programs and Interventions
Part Three.	Evaluation
Volume 2
Part Four.	Inventory of Correctional Programs
Part Five.	Best Practices

Part one -- Contributing to Effective Correctional Programs

In addition to introducing the initiative and purpose of Compendium 2000, Part 1 includes 8 separate chapters. Chapter 1 by James McGuire (University of Liverpool) examines what correctional staff and researchers mean when they talk about a program. Then, In Chapter 2, Don Andrews (Carleton University) describes 18 principles of effective correctional programs. In Chapter 3, Paul Gendreau with Claire Goggin (University of New Brunswick), Francis Cullen (University of Cincinnati), and Don Andrews (Carleton University) quantitatively summarize a substantial body of literature on the effects of community sanctions and incarceration. Chapter 4 by James Bonta (Depatment of Solicitor General) presents an overview of what we know about offender risk assessment. He also includes a discussion of the risk and needs assessments thatunderlie effective treatment. Sharon Kennedy (Correctional Service of Canada), in Chapter 5, addresses the concept of treatment responsivity and exaines a number of responsivity assessment measures currently in use. Then, in Chapter 6, Paul Gendreau, Claire Goggin, and Paula Smith (University of New Brunswick) outline several obstacles to employing best practices, including theoreticism and the failure to effect technology transfer. Chapter 7 by Alan Leschied (University of Western Ontario) presents current findings related to program implementation and the replication of successful programs. Finally, in Chapter 8, Denise Preston (Correctional Service of Canada) reviews th ehistory and evolutionn of the concept of treatment resistance, descibes various reasons for and manifestations of resistance, discusses assessment issues, and suggests strategies to reduce resistance.

Part two -- Correctional Programs/Intervention

This part of Compendium 2000 is organized to provide up-to-date overviews of the treatment literature for specific program areas. The content areas were selected for their relationship to criminality, such that when the appropriate intervention is applied to meet the need it might reasonably be expected to reduce reoffending behaviour. In Chapter 9, Dennis Stevens (University of Massachusetts) examines education as one method of preparing an offender for a safe return to the community. Christa Gillis (Correctional Service of Canada), in Chapter 10, describes current employment measurement techniques and proposes modified measurement strategies. Chapter 11 by Claudio Violato, Mark Genuis, and Elizabeth Oddone-Paolucci (National Foundation for Family Research and Education) deals with various treatment and intervention approaches together with their relative efficacy. Alan Lescheid (University of Western Ontario), in Chapter 12, details the program factors contributing to effectiveness for institutionalized and non-institutionalized young offenders. Chapter 13 by Lynn Stewart, Jim Hill, and Janice Cripps (Correctional Service of Canada) provides a review of issues related to the treatment of spousal violence. Then, in Chapter 14, Lynn Lightfoot (CSC, Consultant) reviews the substance abuse treatment literature. Chapter 15 by Lynn Stewart (Correctional Service of Canada) and Rob Rowe (Carleton University) discusses the problems of self-regulation among adult offenders. James McGuire (University of Liverpool), in Chapter 16, reviews evidence concerning treatment of offenders with mental disorders. He provides definitions, focuses on outcomes and turns our attention to the management of offenders with mental disorder. Chapter 17 by William Marshall (Queen's University) and Sharon Williams (Correctional Service of Canada) explores the assessment and treatment of sex offenders. Ralph Serin and Denise Preston (Correctional Service of Canada), in Chapter 18, investigate programming for violent offenders. Then in Chapter 19, Joe Couture (Athabaska University) outlines the orientation and strategy of the Elders who work with Aboriginal offenders. Chapter 20 by Kelley Blanchette (Correctional Service of Canada) discusses effective correctional practice with women offenders. Finally, Chapter 21 by Claude Tellier and Ralph Serin (Correctional Service of Canada) highlights the contribution that staff makes in the delivery of effective correctional services.

Part Three -- Evaluation

This section of Compendium 2000 provides evaluation guidelines for criminal justice policy makers, correctional administrators and program staff. In Chapter 22, Gerry Gaes (United States Federal Bureau of Prisons) provides guidelines for asking the right questions and communicating results. Then, Laurence Motiuk (Correctional Service of Canada), in Chapter 23, addresses why correctional outcome is so difficult to measure and tries to show how we can measure it as best we can. Ralph Serin (Correctional Service of Canada), in Chapter 24, examines intermediate measures of program effectiveness. Chapter 25, by Paul Gendreau, Claire Goggin, and Paula Smith (University of New Brunswick), describes how meta-analyses can help inform correctional service providers and policy-makers. Then, James McGuire (University of Liverpool), in Chapter 26 describes a program logic model of program effectiveness. Finally, Chapter 27 by Shelley Brown (Correctional Service Canada) explores cost-benefit analysis as it applies to effective correctional treatment.

Part Four -- Inventory of Correctional Programs

Using a standard protocol, the Research Branch surveyed the Federal/Provincial Territorial jurisdictions regarding their correctional programs. The purpose of the survey was to provide an up-to-date inventory of all programs, both institutional and community-based, with an emphasis on effective programming. The survey incorporated program descriptions; development and evaluation; assessments of treatment need; and where applicable, outcome and/or financial data. This information can be used to determine the status of certain types of programs in different jurisdictions, to facilitate information exchange, and to assist in treatment planning for offenders throughout their involvement with the criminal justice system.

Part Five -- Best Practices

Again, using a standard protocol, the Federal/Provincial/Territorial jurisdictions were invited to submit specific programs that they wished to highlight as a best practice.

The Deliverable

Compendium 2000 on Effective Correctional Programming provides a comprehensive and critical appraisal of the empirical literature in the field of corrections and behaviour change. More importantly, it provides new knowledge on program effectiveness, an overview of existing programs in Canadian correctional jurisdictions, and guidelines for evaluating operations and policy in the area of correctional programs.

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¹ 340 Lauier Avenue West, Ottawa, Ontario, K1A 0P9.

² Statistics Canada. (1996). Adult Correctional Services in Canada 1994-95. Ottawa, ON: Canadian Centr for Justice Statistics.

³ Corrections Population Growth. (1997). First Report on Progress for Federal/Provincial/Territorial Ministers Responsible for Justice. Fredricton, New Brunswick.

 

CHAPTER 1

Defining Correctional Programs

JAMES MCGUIRE¹

As a result of the findings of large-scale reviews of offender treatment, presented and discussed in this Compendium, there has recently been a considerable expansion of interest in the use of programs in work with offenders. Using interventions in forms that may be described as programs is not new, and there are examples of this kind of work dating back to the 1940s. The research indicates that the true era of development in this sphere commenced in 1975. This chapter examines what correctional staff and researchers mean when they talk about a program. This is not as straightforward as it sounds, and it is difficult to arrive at a single, clear-cut, unassailable definition of correctional programs that will firmly demarcate them from other forms of activity conducted with individuals sentenced by criminal courts. However, in one sense that does not matter too much. What is much more important is that when any interventions are carried out with offenders, it should be possible to specify what has taken place, in order to direct the work being done, to allow evaluation to occur, and to enable others to learn from the results.

THE GROWTH OF INTEREST IN PROGRAMS

First, it will also be helpful to set the enterprise in a broader context. Correctional programs as we currently observe them being implemented whether in institutional or community settings have a common primary objective. In attempting to accomplish it, correctional programs are just one of a number of endeavours taking place in many agencies and services that share common goals. Those goals revolve around the notion of inducing or supporting some type of change in the people taking part. The desired changes may include imparting knowledge, acquisition of skills, or improved health. But in criminal justice services, this usually hinges upon the concept of correction: the adjustment of behaviour from a pattern that is criminal or anti-social to one that is more law-abiding or pro-social.

To succeed in this requires drawing on methods that overlap, inevitably and sometimes to a considerable extent, with ones employed in other fields. Correctional services form one of a number of public agencies providing a service to the community of which they are a part. Given this role, they have many professional links with other agencies. But in addition, staff with different backgrounds, qualifications and perspectives work within each agency. Prison staff include not only custody or discipline officers dealing with security and management issues. There are also teachers, social workers, probation staff, psychologists, psychiatric nurses, and others. Thus whatever their stated aims and whichever professional group predominates, most public services employ a range of specialist staff. The net effect of this is to blur the boundaries not only between different professional roles, but also between the different activities offered to those who are the consumers of an agency's services.

Also like many other agencies, correctional services attempt to serve (at least) two main “consumers” simultaneously. The publicly declared aim of corrections is to ensure community safety, by detaining or otherwise managing those who have harmed other people's interests. But unless imprisonment is to consist of literal “warehousing”, which few who are familiar with its history would rationally support, it must also then address the needs of prisoners themselves. These two tasks are inextricably inter-related, and this raises fundamental issues for the delivery of correctional programs. For unlike other agencies providing services, the use of coercion and the fact that individuals are (in the vast majority of cases) contained in service settings against their will creates a different dynamic in the manner with which programs have to be delivered. Of course, it is a myth that those who participate on an apparently voluntary basis in school, welfare, or health services always do so willingly. But some framework of restriction of liberty, even if minimal, is integral to virtually all correctional practice, and sets the preconditions for many other aspects of contact between offenders and professional staff, including provision of programs.

Correctional programming has numerous points of contact and degrees of overlap with other types of intervention that have the essential aim of engendering individual change on the basis of personal choice. This includes education, that focuses on helping individuals acquire knowledge and information. It includes training, which is designed to help people acquire manual or cognitive skills for application in the workplace. It also includes therapy, which is intended for alleviation of emotional distress and amelioration of symptoms of mental disorder. All of these processes also instil new modes of thinking and problem-solving that are transferable across situations, and often also new perceptions of and attitudes to the self. Thinking more broadly and considering how this would be viewed in a non Western cultural context, there are also similarities to processes of healing. Each of these domains is virtually impossible to define in any simple, satisfactory and mutually exclusive way.

For some time, the organizations charged with supplying education and training have been accustomed to the idea that there are regular patterns which should be followed in trying to attain the objectives that are set for any given learning task. Those tried-and-tested methods that have successfully secured the objectives in the past become such an established pattern that they have be written down and specified in a manual or hand-book. The concept of a curriculum is founded on this principle.

Recently, in the wake of large-scale reviews of the effectiveness of psychological therapies, there has been a trend towards standardization and manualization of the procedures to be followed (Dobson & Craig, 1998; Nathan & Gorman, 1998). This is partly to allow systematic testing of interventions in carefully controlled research trials. But it is also designed to allow other practitioners to emulate the “best practices” identified in such work. Patterns of individual clinical needs may be such that standardised approaches cannot succeed in tailoring psychotherapeutic interventions to meet everyone's requirements. However, for those types of problems that are experienced by many clients, it has proved possible to develop empirically supported treatments the ingredients of which can be described in detail in accompanying therapist manuals.

Over the last quarter of a century, a similar idea has progressively become implanted in correctional services, and today holds a position of some prominence.

TYPES AND LEVELS OF INTERVENTIONS

The concept of program is now widely discussed in correctional settings, but evidently still means different things to different people. To refine the concept slightly, a useful starting point is to examine different approaches to crime prevention and to the intervention efforts that might be planned and delivered within each. For this purpose we can borrow a familiar distinction, made by Tolan, Guerra, and Hammond (1994), between primary, secondary, and tertiary crime prevention strategies.

Primary prevention consists of two different types of strategies. Situational prevention is designed to limit crime opportunities, sometimes by increased security measures, police patrols, video surveillance, target hardening, or the re-design of environments in residential or retail zones (Eck, 1997; McGuire, 2000; Pease, 1994). Interventions of this type are sometimes referred to as programs; for example, neighbourhood watch programs (Sherman, 1997).

Developmental prevention entails provision of services to families and children in environments, such as socio-economically deprived neighbourhoods, with the aim of reducing long term difficulties including delinquency but also school dropout, mental health problems and substance abuse. Such developmental prevention programs have shown to be potentially highly effective (Yoshikawa, 1994); and in some instances, such as the Perry Preschool Project, have also been shown to be highly cost-effective over long-term follow-up intervals (Schweinhart, Barnes, & Weikart, 1993).

Secondary prevention is focused on known at-risk groups. This includes for example individuals who are identified as pre-delinquents, who are playing truant from school, have con-duct disorders, or are residents of child-care facilities (Kaufman, 1985). In some cases there may be evidence of development of delinquent or anti-social tendencies and efforts are directed towards averting subsequent involvement in juvenile offending. In other circumstances prevention may be broadly aimed at averting gang involvement or drug use in the school population as a whole (Gottfredson, 1997).

Tertiary prevention (Gendreau & Andrews, 1991) is addressed to adjudicated offenders, those already convicted of crimes, with the objective of reducing rates of recidivism. This is the domain of correctional services and the subject-matter of this chapter. Note, however, that correctional services need not be exclusively focused on tertiary prevention; for example youth justice teams may be engaged in some multi-agency programs with a secondary prevention focus.

BASIC CONCEPT AND DEFINITIONS

To an extent, the way a correctional program is defined depends in part on what we consider to be the overall function of society's correctional efforts. This raises rather daunting philosophical questions, concerning the nature of justice or social order, which are beyond the scope of this chapter, but the fact that these issues are inter-dependent should be constantly borne in mind.

With reference to the previous section, the global aims customarily given for criminal justice agencies almost always do relate to preserving the safety of the community. Thus when individuals enter the criminal justice system as adjudicated offenders, the prima facie basis for working with them is to return them to society less likely to offend again. It could be argued, on ethical grounds, that such issues are in principle the only ones with which correctional services should be concerned.

On scanning the literature it is possible to discover that the word “program” is used in at least three separate though inter-related ways.

Definition one

The types of interventions known as programs may be employed at any of the levels mentioned above (primary, secondary, or tertiary), but for present purposes discussion will be limited to the tertiary, in which most correctional service agencies usually operate. Within this context, the typical program is a circumscribed set of activities, with an appointed objective, and consisting of a number of elements that are mutually inter-connected. In its first, strictest terms, a correctional program can be defined at its core as a planned sequence of learning opportunities delivered to adjudicated offenders with the general objective of reducing their subsequent criminal recidivism. From a behavioural perspective, it is intrinsic to this that a constructional approach is adopted. This entails the reduction of undesirable behaviour through the application of positive reinforcement procedures and repertoire-building techniques. As Gendreau (1996) has indicated, positive reinforcers should outnumber punishers in a ratio of not less than 4:1.

This definition implies that a program has a specified objective and it should be possible for this to be clearly stated by its designers, users, evaluators and preferably also its participants. There may be intermediate objectives that in practice are only distantly connected to the goal of reducing recidivism; but the nature of any such linkage should be explained in sup-porting program documentation. There should be a planned sequence of activities. This might be called a curriculum: a series of sessions or a timetable. It is the physical representation of what is involved in trying to operationalize the program's objectives. The program should have internal coherence, in the sense that the activities that are planned can be shown to be justifiable for achieving the objectives. This should hold both theoretically (there is a sound model on which the design of the program is based) and empirically (there is evidence concerning its effectiveness, either as a totality or in terms of its components).

At first sight this may appear highly prescriptive. Regrettably, the entire concept of programming alienates some staff who misperceive it as a mechanised attempt to brainwash offenders. Others confuse it with the idea of programmed learning, in which specially prepared texts or interactive computer software is used to guide individuals through a knowledge-acquisition process. Methods designed in this way could form a part of some interventions; but this is distinct from what is usually referred to as correctional programming.

Outside corrections, the closest parallel to this concept is perhaps the curriculum in educational settings. This usually has an objective (e.g., to help students learn a language to a certain standard). It will entail activities, methods and materials designed to achieve this goal. There will be a clear, demonstrable link between the two and some procedures for monitoring and evaluating their achievement.

Definition two

In corrections the word program is also used in a second, broader and more flexible sense. For example, mentoring schemes for young offenders, or therapeutic communities for substance-abusing offenders are also referred to as programs. In the purer sense of definition one, the term is here a misnomer. But it is possible to specify the objectives of both these processes and to define operationally what is intended to happen within them. Thus if the experiences which are to be arranged for participants can be adequately described, to the extent that other practitioners could adopt and replicate them, it is still accurate to use the word program as applicable to these interventions.

Activities such as mentoring, intensive supervision, or physical challenge do not however contain the detailed pre-planning or expectation of measured development that is a central feature of programs in definition one. Individual change may occur, but there is no explicit structure or designated sequence through which participants progress as is the case in, for example, a cognitive skills program.

This flexibility of nomenclature can lead to confusion. Mentoring may be an added element in a juvenile correctional service in which young offenders also participate in structured activities programs that would satisfy the first definition given above. That might similarly occur in the setting of a therapeutic community. Evidently, it is very difficult to delineate the outer limits of what is meant by a correctional program.

Definition three

Taking a far broader perspective, MacKenzie (1997) has classified criminal justice interventions into six separate but overlapping groups, as follows.

• Incapacitation. Removing the offender's capacity to commit crimes, usually through detention (incarceration).
• Deterrence. Punitive sanctions which as a result of the infliction of pain or discomfort will deter individual offenders subjected to them (specific deterrence) or other potential offenders and members of the public-at-large (general deterrence). The primary means of accomplishing this is through restriction of liberty but additional sanctions may also be applied as in a correctional boot camp.
• Rehabilitation. Provision of treatment or allied forms of intervention designed to alter the thoughts, feelings or behaviour of individual offenders.
• Community restraints. This includes surveillance, supervision, or other methods of closely monitoring an individual's behaviour or sphere of activities such as to preclude engagement with crime opportunities.
• Structure, discipline and challenge. Physically (and some-times mentally) demanding experiences designed to influence individuals' attitudes in a positive way or to act as a deterrent against further criminality.
• Combining rehabilitation and restraint. An amalgamation of methods of treatment with methods of surveillance or limitation of liberty that will enforce compliance with requirements.

This constitutes, potentially, a third definition of the word “program”. It may be important however to distinguish between the above aspects which are structures of the criminal justice system and that flow directly from judicial sentencing; and efforts made by other correctional agencies to introduce active change ingredients into the context set by this framework. While it is a widespread public expectation that the sentence of a court will in itself have an impact on offenders, there is little evidence to support this supposition. Examination of data concerning the differential impact of sentencing on recidivism, using official criminal statistics and making comparisons between predicted and actual rates of reoffending amongst large samples, shows that sentencing per se is largely irrelevant to outcome (McGuire, 1998). It is on this basis that Andrews (1995) has argued that the sentence can only ever be the starting condition for programmatic intervention.

We might also question whether punishment and deterrence can be conceptualized as programs. From a layperson's standpoint, the raison d'être of criminal justice is to punish offenders for their wrongdoing (Walker, 1991). Punishment is, metaphorically speaking, the correctional equivalent of cosmic background radiation in physics; pervasive and ever-present. Simultaneously, there are additional punitive sanctions, or enhanced punishments, which can be introduced into the framework of existing sanctions; they may form the experimental conditions in some correctional research studies (Lipsey, 1992; Sherman, 1988). Yet when correctional staff, practitioners or researchers, refer to correctional programming they rarely mean innovations of this type. They are more likely to denote a set of activities with psycho-educational, therapeutic, or skills-training purposes and methods, as in the first definition given above.

Perhaps the focal defining aspect of a program does not reside in the kinds of external, directly observable components described earlier. Rather, the pivotal feature could be the proposed vehicle of change. This is the mechanism within a program which it is presumed (or preferably, firmly demonstrated) will produce the difference in recidivism that is the program designer's and the agency's ultimate goal. For punishment, that would (theoretically) consist of personal discomfort in offenders resulting from loss of liberty, the general privations of prison life, or the physical demands of a correctional boot camp regime. For a cognitive or interpersonal skills program, it would be the acquisition of new capacities for analysing and solving problems or for interacting with others. For a therapeutic community, it would entail the gradual experience of re-socialisation and growth of personal insight as daily interactions with others shape new kinds of behaviours, feelings, or beliefs. But these concepts themselves vary enormously between different types of programs, and the crossovers and exchanges between them are too numerous to permit them to serve as useful definitional markers.

VARIETIES OF OFFENDER PROGRAMS

One of the recurrent difficulties of defining programs on the basis of available literature is that descriptions of them are often used in loose, overlapping, and sometimes incompatible ways. The same program can be conceptualized in different terms depending on which aspect of it is highlighted. In addition, reviewers of research (including meta-analysts) invariably develop their own classification or coding systems when grouping programs together to compare effect sizes. Thus, an interpersonal skills program could be defined straightforward by that label. But equally, it could be categorized under the headings skills-training, behavioural, or cognitive depending on which aspect of it a reviewer perceived as most salient. Alternatively, as a function of its location in correctional services, it might instead be subsumed under some other title such as diversion or intensive supervision.

For example, Palmer (1996) reviewed a wide range of studies on the treatment of offenders, including 9 meta-analyses and 23 narrative literature reviews available at that date. This led to a classification of correctional interventions that showed considerable diversity. They included: confrontation; area-wide strategies of delinquency prevention; social casework; social agency, or societal institution approaches to delinquency prevention; diversion; physical challenge; restitution; group counselling or therapy; individual counselling or therapy; family intervention; vocational training; employment; educational training; behavioural approaches; cognitive-behavioural or cognitive approaches; life skills; multimodal approaches; probation or parole enhancement; and intensive super-vision (probation or aftercare/parole) (Palmer, 1996, p. 134-5). As found by Palmer, there were systematic differences in effects between these different categories, even after allowing for sizeable variation within some of the groupings named.

Further, in different programs these elements might be operating singly or in combination. Palmer drew a distinction between categories of program, such as the different types of intervention listed above, and program components. The latter were more basic building blocks of interventions. If a program contained only one such element, it could be called unimodal; however, combined or multimodal programs incorporating several elements are much more common. Given the well-established pattern that a wide range of factors is associated with criminal behaviour (Farrington, 1996), it is scarcely surprising that programs deploying several methods and focusing on several targets emerge consistently well from the meta-analyses (e.g., Lipsey, 1992).

Extending this discussion, Palmer (1996) also sought to distinguish between programmatic and non-programmatic aspects of interventions. The former include all the categories and species of program elements cited earlier. The latter include a range of factors that are widely considered to be prerequisites of program success but are much more difficult to specify. They include staff characteristics; features of staff-client interactions; offender characteristics; and aspects of the settings in which programs are delivered. While not integral components of the definition of most programs, it is recognized that these issues can play a critical part in determining program outcomes. The importance of such factors has been considered in some detail by other authors including Andrews (1995), Gendreau (1996), and Lösel (1995).

Dimensions of variation in programs

The following are some principal dimensions in respect of which correctional programs vary.

Theoretical model

Programs differ according to the models of crime causation or of individual change on which they are based. Whilst the most successful programs to date involve applications of cognitive/ social-learning models, many other approaches exist and have obtained modest and occasionally larger effect sizes.

Treatment targets (criminogenic needs)

It is essential, if programs are to be effective in changing risk of future offending, that they are focused on aspects of individuals' functioning that have been shown to be linked to criminal acts. Programs vary in the number, range, and degree of inter-relatedness of such targets. These are sometimes defined on the basis of established risk factors for offending (Andrews, 1995), such as cognitive or social skills deficits, substance abuse, impulsiveness, or anti-social attitudes. In other instances, they are linked to different types of offence, such as programs for bur-glary, car theft, or violence.

Dosage

Programs also vary simply in the numbers and duration of staff-client contacts; in their intensity over time; and in their overall time-scale of delivery. Following the risk principle it would be expected that there will be a correspondence between risk levels and assignment to different degrees of program intensity; but this relationship may not be linear. For example highly recidivistic, substance-abusing offenders may require several dimensions of program input.

Criminal justice setting

The most immediately obvious aspect of this is whether programs are delivered in institutions or in the community, with most research reviews showing the latter to yield superior effect sizes. Programs also vary in respect of the kind of agency within which they are run, the point during sentences when programming is carried out, and the amount of access to other services concurrently.

Sentencing context

The nature of the sentence imposed may have a direct influence on program delivery, as it will influence the amount of control in the hands of correctional staff, with potential consequences for the degree of participation by offenders.

Specificity

There are differences between programs in terms of the specificity of their objectives. Whereas some may have a very precise focus on a single problem area (e.g., anger management), others may have very broad objectives and a wide spectrum of treatment targets. Given the findings from large-scale reviews concerning their superior effectiveness, multimodal programs, using a combination of targets and methods of working, are usually seen as more powerful agents of change.

Program portfolios

Within a single institution there may be a range of program opportunities. Correctional services such as Correctional Service Canada have developed a hierarchy of program types, varying along several of the above dimensions (see below). Correctional planning principles can then suggest the most appropriate array of programs for an inmate, moving for example from generic, broad-ranging and multimodal programs to others with more specific treatment targets. Conceptually, such programs may be arranged in a hierarchy that permits managers and treatment providers to have an overview of the total pattern of services available within the setting.

Programs also differ in other respects; for example, whether they are designed for delivery on an individual or group basis. Both for reasons of economy and for the other advantages gained from joint activity and collaborative learning, a majority of extant programs are based on a group format.

TARGET POPULATION

Another important issue is that of who should participate in a program. In one sense that may seem obvious: the offender allocated to take part. However, it can be tentatively suggested that the more support individuals have from different aspects of their social environments, the likelier it is that they will achieve change. Evidence supportive of this comes from the impact of the presence of significant others in the Aggression Replacement Training package development by Goldstein and colleagues (Goldstein, Glick, Carthan, & Blancero, 1994). Effect sizes increased sharply as a function of the inclusion of one person who was part of the offender's own social world, selected by each participant, in program sessions. Such effects may be increased still further as more and more domains of the environment are activated in support of behaviour change. Thus Multi-Systemic Therapy which entails programming simultaneously at the individual, family and school levels (Hengeller, Schoenwald, Borduin, Rowland, & Cunningham, 1998) has yielded some of the highest effect sizes published to date (Borduin, Mann, Cone, & Hengeller, 1995).²

CORRECTIONAL PROGRAM STRATEGIES

The variety of correctional programs now available is immense and both their number and diversity are steadily increasing. To date, the most extensive range of programs in place are those managed by Correctional Service Canada (CSC) and the world-wide development of interest in correctional programming owes much to initiatives taken within the Service. The Reasoning and Rehabilitation program is probably the best known and most widely applied intervention of its type, now used in a number of countries. It consists of 35 two-hour group-based sessions and has been delivered in both prison and probation settings. Already however, much more intensive programs exist. For example, CSC's Violent Offender Program consists of a total of 120 two-hour sessions. Somewhat different however is the Women's Peer Support Program based in the Edmonton Institution for Women, which consists of provision of on-call support to women inmates, for example to help deal with personal crises. Staff and volunteers attend a 17-session training program prior to becoming available for this purpose.

In the United Kingdom, interest in programs has developed apace in recent years, and a number of cognitive-skills programs have been accredited for application in prisons. They include Reasoning and Rehabilitation; Enhanced Thinking Skills, a 20-session program; and Problem-Solving Training and Offence Behaviour, a 30-session program that engages offenders in analyzing their own criminal actions. These interventions, alongside others focused on communication skills development and substance abuse, have been appraised by an independent Accreditation Panel in terms of an agreed set of criteria. The latter are designed to ensure that programs meet standards derived from the empirical research base afforded by meta-analytic reviews.

A similar process is now occurring in the community-based sector of criminal justice, both in adult probation and juvenile offender services. The Home Office's Probation Unit has designated a number of programs as Pathfinders, which is a preliminary developmental status prior to potentially achieving full accreditation. Programs designated so far cover a wide range of offence problems or modes of delivery, including one-to-one work in probation settings; substance abuse; responsible driving; domestic violence; sex offenders; and women offenders. Additional programs are being developed focused on basic survival skills, inmate resettlement, community service, and for incorporation in sentences of probation with additional requirements.

Correctional services in the United States have implemented a broad spectrum of offender treatment programs. They range from interventions for juveniles, including Aggression Replacement Training (Goldstein et al., 1994) or Multi-Systemic Therapy (Hengeller et al., 1998), to prison-based therapeutic communities and after-care programs for substance-abusing offenders such as Amity and Vista (Wexler, Graham, Koronowski, & Lowe, 1995). Given the scale and diversity of the correctional services and agencies in the United States, there is as yet no integrated national strategy for program implementation as can be found in Canada and more recently in the United Kingdom. For a review of a wide range of correctional service tertiary prevention programs drawing primarily on research work in the United States, MacKenzie (1997) is an invaluable source.

SAFEGUARDING INTEGRITY

Regardless of precisely how programs are defined and their ingredients assembled together, certain issues are now seen as paramount in ensuring that they are properly delivered. Lipsey (1992) found marked differences in effectiveness between programs that were thoroughly monitored and those that were not. Moncher and Prinz (1991) found that the integrity of delivery of a program has been shown to be vitally important in mental health settings. Similarly Hollin (1995) has explicated its importance when running behavioural programs and in the treatment of offenders in general.

Thus, all commentators in this field now acknowledge that it is vital that programs be delivered as planned. Procedures need to be in place to monitor this process, and to furnish feedback to program managers or external consultants. The maintenance of program integrity is known to be dependent on appropriate training of staff, provision of adequate resources, good communication between designers, managers, tutors of programs, availability of supervision, and use of some means of measuring client level of participation and change over time.

Equally, many of these tasks will be facilitated if clearly presented manuals and other associated materials support the program itself. Both the program as a whole and its constituent sessions should have clearly stipulated objectives. This is a foundation for many other aspects of the work: unless staff involved in delivering a program can visualise the required con-tents of sessions, their quality of delivery is likely to deteriorate. During training, staff should practise delivery and have opportunities to be observed by trainers. There should in addition be a clearly defined set of staff competency criteria to be met by those delivering the program. All of these components are products of the core definition of the program and its objectives by its planners. Whatever the nature of a program, it is crucial that these aspects can be clearly defined, if other aspects of delivery are not to become confused and dysfunctional as a result.

ACCREDITATION PROCESSES

Informed by the steadily accumulating body of treatment-outcome research in work with offenders, correctional services, in several countries, are seeking to establish well-validated intervention programs together with methods of monitoring their application. The optimal route selected by a number of services is the development of procedures for accreditation of programs designed to reduce recidivism.

The model adopted by the United Kingdom involves the recruitment by prison and probation services of an independent, external panel of expert consultants. Programs thought to be suit-able for accreditation and delivery in criminal justice settings are submitted to the panel. A submission should include copies of all relevant materials such as a statement of the program's theoretical rationale; session manuals; staff training manuals; assessment and evaluation measures; and other supporting documentation. These are then judged against a pre-agreed set of accreditation criteria that define the minimal requirements for approval of a program (HM Prison Service, 1999; Home Office, 1999). These require that the following specifications should be met.

1. Model of change. There should be a clear, evidence-based theoretical model underpinning the program that explains how it is proposed that it will have an impact on factors linked to offending behaviour.
2. Dynamic risk factors. Program materials should identify factors linked to offending, specified in the model, and which, if changed, will lead to a reduction in risk of reoffending, and the program contents should reflect these objectives.
3. Range of targets. Multi-modal programs with a range of treatment targets have yielded the largest effect sizes in research reviews. Program manuals specify an appropriate range of targets and the nature of their inter-relationships.
4. Effective methods. The methods of change utilized in the program should have empirical support concerning effectiveness and be co-ordinated in an appropriate way.
5. Skills orientated. Programs targeting skills that will enable offenders to avoid criminal activities have yielded higher effect sizes in outcome studies. These skills should have explicit links to risk of reoffending and its reduction.
6. Intensity, sequencing, duration. The overall amount of programming (numbers of contact hours), the mode of delivery of sessions, and total program duration should be appropriate in the light of available evidence, the program's objectives and contents, and the risk level of the targeted offender groups.
7. Selection of offenders. The population of offenders for whom the program is designed should be explicitly and clearly specified. There should be agreed and realistic procedures for targeting and selection, and for exclusion of inappropriate referrals.
8. Engagement and participation. This criterion refers to the principle of responsivity. Information should be provided concerning how this will be addressed, and how offenders will be encouraged and motivated to take part in and adhere to the program.
9. Case Management. In prison settings, offenders are allocated a personal officer with responsibility for overseeing their individual sentence plans. On probation, a Case Manager supervises them. To be effective, programs should be inter-linked with this process, and guidelines provided for implementation within services.
10. Ongoing monitoring. In order to safeguard program and treatment integrity, procedures should be in place for collection of monitoring “quality-of-delivery” data, and systems established for its review and for taking action on the basis of it.
11. Evaluation. Finally, program materials should include assessment and evaluation measures, and a framework for evaluation of the program's overall delivery, short-term, and long-term impact.

With regard to each criterion, a program may score 0 (not met), 1 (partially met), or 2 (fully met). Some of the above criteria (items 1, 2, 7, 9, 10 and 11) are mandatory; in other words it is essential that the requirements be fully met. To be accredited, a program must achieve a minimum score of 19/22 points, including full marks on all mandatory items.

In addition to program accreditation, each location in correctional services (a prison, probation office, or other unit) must also satisfactorily meet criteria for site accreditation. This is part of a process of certifying program and treatment integrity at that site. Systems for collecting monitoring information must be in place, and the data so collected made available for an annual site audit. Audit reports are then scrutinised both by correctional agency staff and by members of the independent accreditation panel.

Lipton, Thornton, McGuire, Porporino, and Hollin (2000) described the introduction of these processes into the prison service in England and Wales from 1996 onwards. As noted above, a number of cognitive-skills programs have been accredited for prison services, and are in use in more than 60 prison establishments. In 1999, a parallel process was launched for probation services under the scrutiny of a new Joint Prison-Probation Accreditation Panel. Analogous practices have been adopted in Scotland (which has a separate prison administration), and at the time of writing, similar practices are in prospect in a number of other countries also.

PROGRAM IMPLEMENTATION AND DELIVERY

Clearly, the transformation of correctional services in order to move into an era of extensive delivery of programs is a massive undertaking. It is beyond the scope of this chapter to address the considerable inertia that exists in large organisations and the major issues that must be addressed if constructive change is to occur in the direction of evidence-based practice.

Several authors have provided valuable guidelines for sensibly directing this process. Reflecting on the general context of installing new programs in organisational settings, Bernfeld, Blase, and Fixsen (1990) have advocated the adoption of a multi-level systems perspective. This entails focusing on four separate but related levels of analysis; client; program; organization; and societal. Programs should not be seen in isolation but as parts of an interactive, dynamic and evolving whole. Using different terminology but addressing essentially the same issues and problems, Harris and Smith (1996) have discussed how to implement programmatic developments in community-based correctional services. More recently, Gendreau, Goggin, and Smith (1999) have forwarded a set of systematised principles for guiding the total process of program implementation.

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¹ University of Liverpool, United Kingdom

² There is evidence that even amongst situational crime prevention programs, interventions are more effective if they contain elements of community action and participation (McGuire, 2000).

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REFERENCES

Andrews, D. A. (1995). The psychology of criminal conduct and effective treatment. In J. McGuire (Ed.) What works: Reducing reoffending: Guidelines from research and practice. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons.

Bernfeld, G. A., Blase, K. A., & Fixsen, D. L. (1990). Towards a unified perspective on human service delivery systems: Application of the teaching-family model. In R. J. & R. DeV. Peters (Eds.) Behavioral disorders of adolescence. New York, NY: Plenum Press.

Borduin, C. M., Mann, B. J., Cone, L. T., & Hengeller, S. W. (1995). Multi-systemic treatment of serious juvenile offenders: Long-term prevention of criminality and violence. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 63, 569-578.

Dobson, K. S., & Craig, K. (Eds.) (1998). Empirically supported treatments: Best practice in professional psychology. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Eck, J. (1997). Preventing crime at places. In L. W. Sherman, D. Gottfredson, D. L. Mackenzie, J. Eck, P. Reuter, & S. Bushway, Preventing crime: What works, what doesn't, what's promising. Washington, DC: Office of Justice Programs.

Farrington, D. P. (1996). The explanation and prevention of youthful offending. In J. D. Hawkins (Ed.) Delinquency and crime: Current theories. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Gendreau, P. (1996). The principles of effective intervention with offenders. In A. T. Harland (Ed.) Choosing correctional options that work: Defining the demand and evaluating the supply. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Gendreau, P., & Andrews, D. A. (1991). Tertiary prevention: What the meta-analyses of the offender treatment literature tell us about “what works”. Canadian Journal of Criminology, 32, 173-184.

Gendreau, P., & Goggin, C. (1996). Principles of effective correctional programming. Forum on Corrections Research, 8 (3), 38-4 1.

Gendreau, P., Goggin, C., & Smith, P. (1999). The forgotten issue in effective correctional treatment: Program implementation. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 43, 180-187.

Goldstein, A. P., Glick, B., Carthan, W., & Blancero, D. A. (1994). The prosocial gang: Implementing aggression replacement training. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Gottfredson, D. (1997). School-based crime prevention. In L. W. Sherman, D. Gottfredson, D. L. Mackenzie, J. Eck, P. Reuter, & S. Bushway, Preventing crime: What works, what doesn't, what's promising. Washington, DC: Office of Justice Programs.

Harris, P., & Smith, S. (1996). Developing community corrections: An implementation perspective. In A. T. Harland (Ed.), Choosing correctional options that work: Defining the demand and evaluating the supply. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Henggeler, S. W., Schoenwald, S. K., Borduin, C. M., Rowland, M. D., & Cunningham, P. B. (1998). Multisystemic treatment of antisocial behavior in children and adolescents. New York NY: Guilford Press.

Her Majesty's Prison Service (1999). Service criteria for accrediting programs 1998-99. London: HM Prison Service, Offending Behaviour Programmes Unit.

Hollin, C. R.(1995). The meaning and implications of program integrity. In J. McGuire (Ed.), What works: Reducing reoffending: Guidelines from research and practice. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons.

Home Office (1999). Criteria for accreditation of programs. London, UK: Home Office Probation Unit.

Kaufman, P. (1985). Meta-analysis of juvenile delinquency prevention programs. Unpublished Master's Thesis, Claremont Graduate School.

Lipsey, M. W. (1992). Juvenile delinquency treatment: A meta-analytic inquiry into the variability of effects. In T. Cook, D. Cooper, H. Corday, H. Hartman, L. Hedges, R. Light, T. Louis, & F. Mosteller (Eds.), Meta-analysis for explanation: A casebook. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation.

Lipton, D. S., Thornton, D., McGuire, J. , Porporino, F., & Hollin, C. R. (2000). Program accreditation and correctional treatment. Substance Use and Misuse, 35, 1705-1734.

Lösel, F. (1995). The efficacy of correctional treatment: A review and synthesis of meta-evaluations. In J. McGuire (Ed.), What works: Reducing reoffending: Guidelines from research and practice. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons.

Mackenzie, D. L. (1997). Criminal justice and crime prevention. In L. W. Sherman, D. Gottfredson, D. L. Mackenzie, J. Eck, P. Reuter, & S. Bushway, Preventing crime: What works, what doesn't, what's promising. Washington, DC: Office of Justice Programs.

McGuire, J. (1998). Memorandum of evidence. In Third report of the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee on Alternatives to custodial sentences. London, UK: The Stationery Office.

McGuire, J. (2000). Property offenders. In C. R. Hollin (Ed.), Handbook of offender assessment and treatment. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons.

Moncher, F. J., & Prinz, R. J. (1991). Treatment fidelity in outcome studies. Clinical Psychology Review, 11, 247-266.

Nathan, P. E., & Gorman, J. M. (Eds.) (1998). A guide to treatments that work. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Palmer, T. (1996). Programmatic and non-programmatic aspects of successful intervention. In A. T. Harland (Ed.), Choosing correctional options that work: Defining the demand and evaluating the supply. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Pease, K. (1994). Crime prevention. In M. Maguire, R. Morgan, & R. Reiner (Eds.) The Oxford handbook of criminology. Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press.

Schweinhart, L. J., Barnes, H. V., & Weikart, D. P. (1993). Significant benefits: The high/scope Perry Preschool Project. Ypsilanti, MI: High/Scope Press.

Sherman, L. W. (1988). Randomized experiments in criminal sanctions. In H. S. Bloom, D. S. Cordray, & R. J. Light (Eds.), Lessons from selected program and policy areas. New Directions for Program Evaluation, no. 37. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Sherman, L. W. (1997). Introduction: The congressional mandate to evaluate. In L. W. Sherman, D. Gottfredson, D. L. Mackenzie, J. Eck, P. Reuter, & S. Bushway, Preventing crime: What works, what doesn't, what's promising. Washington, DC: Office of Justice Programs.

Tolan, P. H., Guerra, N. G., & Hammond, W. R. (1994). Prevention and treatment of adolescent violence. In L. D. Eron, J. H. Gentry, & P. Schlegel (Eds.), Reason to hope: A psychosocial perspective on violence and youth. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Walker, N. (1991). Why punish? Theories of punishment reassessed. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

Wexler, H. K., Graham, W. F., Koronowski, R., & Lowe, L. (1995). Evaluation of Amity in-prison and post-release substance abuse treatment programs. Washington, DC: National Institute of Drug Abuse.

Yoshikawa, H. (1994). Prevention as cumulative protection: Effects of early family support and education on chronic delinquency and its risks. Psychological Bulletin, 115, 28-54.

 

CHAPTER 2

Principles of Effective Correctional Programs

DONALD A. ANDREWS¹

This chapter provides a brief outline of principles of effective correctional treatment. The principles recognize the importance of individual differences in criminal behaviour. A truly interdisciplinary psychology of criminal conduct (PCC: Andrews & Bonta, 1998) has matured to the extent that progress has been made with reference to the achievement of two major scientific standards of understanding. In brief, individual differences in criminal activity can be predicted and influenced at levels well above chance and to a practically significant degree. The following principles of effective treatment draw heavily upon that knowledge base. This does not imply that the research base is anywhere near complete with reference to most issues. Rather, all of the following principles are subject to further investigation, including even those principles with relatively strong research support at this time. Also, principles not even hinted at here are expected to be developed and validated in the coming months and years.

To date, PCC has advanced because it is specific about what it attempts to account for, that is, individual differences in criminal behaviour including reoffending on the part of adjudicated offenders. It has advanced also because it recognizes that the risk factors for criminal conduct may be biological, personal, interpersonal, and/or structural, cultural, political and economic; and may reflect immediate circumstances. PCC does not limit its view to the biological, the personal, or to differential levels of privilege and/or victimisation in social origin as may be indexed by age, race, class and gender. This PCC does not purport to be a psychology of criminal justice, a psychology of social justice, a sociology of aggregated crime rates, or a behavioural or social science of social inequality, of poverty, or of a host of other legitimate but different interests.

In applications of PCC, however, these many other legitimate but different interests may not only be of value but may well be paramount. For example, within criminal law and justice systems, principles of retribution and/or restoration may be considered paramount and hence any correctional treatment efforts, if offered at all, must be offered and evaluated within the retributive and/or restorative context. Similarly, the effects of human service efforts may be evaluated within the context of institutional and/or community corrections. Moreover, ideals of justice, ethicality, decency, legality, safety and cost-efficiency are operating in judicial and correctional contexts as they are operating in other contexts of human endeavour. Thus, the principles of effective human service reviewed here are presented in the context of seeking ethical, legal, decent, cost-effective, safe, just and otherwise normative human service efforts aimed at reducing reoffending.

The phrase “otherwise normative” covers a vast area and is included in recognition of the fact that under some political conditions the values and norms of some privileged groups may be dominant no matter how weak the connection between compliance with their norms and the enhancement of peace and security. For example, sentencing according to criminal law and the principle of specific deterrence continues to occur in Canada and other countries even though there is no consistent evidence that reoffending is reduced through increases in the severity of negative sanctioning. Similarly, principles of effective human service in a justice context may be applied even when the sanctions themselves have been handed down with little concern for reducing reoffending (for example, under a pure just desert sanction) or as an attempt to provide restitution for the victim (for example, under a restorative justice disposition).

The following principles have to do with clinically relevant programming and with setting, staff, implementation and integrity issues. The first set of principles, however, restate and underscore the importance of the theoretical and normative issues referred to in the opening paragraphs. The research evidence is appended along with some relevant references to earlier reviews of principles.

SOME PRINCIPLES OF THEORY, IDEOLOGY, JUSTICE AND SETTING IN SEEKING REDUCED REOFFENDING

Principle 1

Base your intervention efforts on a psychological theory of criminal behaviour as opposed to a biological, behavioural, psycho-logical, sociological, humanistic, judicial or legal perspective on justice, social equality or aggregated crime rates. When the interest is reduced reoffending at the individual level, theories that focus on some other outcome are of reduced value because they are less likely to identify relevant variables and strategies. The average effects on reduced reoffending of interventions based on alternatives to a psychology of crime have been negative or negligible (See Endnote). In brief, if you are interested in individual differences in criminal activity (for example, reducing reoffending) work from a theory of criminal behaviour.

Principle 2

The recommended psychological perspective is a broad band general personality and social learning approach to understanding variation in criminal behaviour including criminal recidivism. This perspective identifies the eight following major risk factors for criminal behaviour:

• attitudes, values, beliefs, rationalisations and cognitive emotional states specifically supportive of criminal behaviour;
• immediate interpersonal and social support for antisocial behaviour;
• fundamental personality and temperamental supports such as weak self-control, restless aggressive energy and adventurous pleasure seeking;
• a history of antisocial behaviour including early onset;
• problematic circumstances in the domains of home, school/work, and leisure/recreation;
• substance abuse. (Principles 5-8).

The general personality and social learning perspectives also identify the major behavioural influence strategies such as modelling, reinforcement and cognitive restructuring in the context of a reasonably high quality interpersonal relationship (Principle 9, 16) The behavioural base of this perspective also suggests that treatment is best offered in the community-based settings in which problematic behaviour occurs (Principle 4). In addition, the behaviour of workers in correctional settings is also under the influence of cognition, social support, behavioural history and fundamental personality predisposition and hence the emphasis placed on the selection, training and supervision of workers (Principle 16, 17).

Principle 3

Introduce human service strategies and do not rely on the principles of retribution or restorative justice and do not rely on principles of deterrence (specific and/or general) and/or on incapacitation. More-over, seriously consider and introduce but do not rely upon other principles of justice and normative appropriateness such as professional credentials, ethicality, legality, decency, and efficiency. Rather, reductions in reoffending are to be found through the design and delivery of clinically relevant and psychologically appropriate human service under conditions and settings considered just, ethical, legal, decent, efficient, and otherwise normative. In brief, the task assigned by the human service principle of effective service is to design and deliver effective human service in a just and otherwise normative context. The principles of effective human service do not vary greatly with such considerations, although the justice and normative contexts themselves may vary tremendously. The setting factor of community versus institutional corrections, however, does lead to a separate principle.

Principle 4

Community-based services are preferred over residential/ institutional settings but, if justice or other concerns demand a residential or custodial placement, community-oriented services are recommended. Community-oriented services refer to services facilitating return to the community and facilitating appropriate service delivery in the community. The principles of relapse prevention provide guidance for clinically relevant community-oriented services. When services are community-based, a supplementary consideration is to favour home and school-based services rather than agency-based services. For example, the best of the family interventions are not delivered in agency offices but in the natural settings of home and community.

PRINCIPLES OF RISK, NEED, RESPONSIVITY, STRENGTH, MULTIMODAL SERVICE, AND SERVICE RELEVANT ASSESSMENT

Principle 5 -- Risk

More intensive human services are best reserved for higher risk cases. Low risk cases have a low probability of recidivism even in the absence of service. With the lowest risk cases, justice may be served through just dispositions and there is no need to intro-duce correctional treatment services in order to reduce risk. Indeed, a concern in working with the lowest risk cases is that the pursuit of justice does not inadvertently increase risk through, for example, increased association with offenders and/or the acquisition of pro-criminal attitudes and beliefs. Additionally, recognize that well controlled outcome studies have yet to find reduced reoffending when human service is delivered to the highest risk cases such as very high risk egocentric offenders with extended histories of antisocial behaviour. There is the possibility that psychopaths may put any new skills acquired in treatment to antisocial use (see Principle 10, specific responsivity). At this time, however, there are no well-controlled outcome studies of clinically appropriate treatment with psychopaths.

Principle 6 -- Target Criminogenic Need

Treatment services best attempt to reduce major dynamic risk factors and/or to enhance major protective or strength factors. Criminogenic needs are dynamic risk factors that when reduced are followed by reduced reoffending and/or protective factors that when enhanced are followed by reduced reoffending. Following the major risk factors, the most promising targets include moving antisocial cognition and cognitive emotional states such as resentment in the less antisocial direction, reducing association with antisocial others and enhancing association with anticriminal others, and building self-management, self-regulation and problem solving skills. A history of antisocial behaviour can not be eliminated but new less risky behaviours may be acquired and practised in risky situations (as in relapse prevention programs). Rewards for non-criminal behaviour may be enhanced in the settings of home, school/work and leisure. In the home, the major intermediate targets are enhanced caring, nurturance and mutual respect in combination with monitoring, supervision and appropriate discipline. Similarly, reduced substance abuse may shift the pattern of rewards such that the non-criminal is favoured. The less promising intermediate targets of change include enhancing self-esteem and reducing personal distress without touching personal and interpersonal supports for crime, increasing fear of official punishment, and a focus on other weak risk factors. In summary, for adherence with the need principle, emphasize the reduction of criminogenic need and do not rely upon or emphasize the reduction of noncriminogenic need.

Principle 7 -- Multimodal

Target a number of criminogenic needs. The meta-analyses now make it clear that a number of the criminogenic needs of high-risk cases are best targeted.

Principle 8 -- Assessing risk and dynamic factor

Adherence to the principles of risk and criminogenic need depend upon the reliable and valid assessment of risk and need. The best instruments sample the major risk factors and can provide evidence of validity with younger and older cases, men and women, and different ethnic groups in a number of justice and correctional contexts. Assessments of risk best sample the eight risk factors as well as very specific indicators when specialized outcomes are sought. The latter specific indicators, for example, would include deviant sexual arousal and cognitive and/or social support for sexual offending when reduced sex offending is the desired outcome. Similarly, attitudinal and social support for battering would be specific risk factors when reduced family violence is the desired outcome. Please do not confuse seriousness of the current offence with risk of reoffending. Seriousness of the offence is an aggravating factor at time of sentencing but not a major risk factor.

Principle 9 -- General responsivity

Responsivity has to do with matching the style, modes and influence strategies of service with the learning styles, motivation, aptitude and ability of cases. Generally, offenders are human beings and hence the principle suggests use of the most powerful influencing strategies that have been demonstrated with human beings. Consistent with the general personality and social learning perspective, these most powerful approaches are structured behavioural, social learning and cognitive behavioural influence strategies. These fundamentals include reinforcement, model-ling, skill acquisition through reinforced practice in the context of role playing and graduated approximations, extinction, and cognitive restructuring. Reinforcement, extinction, modelling effects and the attractiveness of the setting of change are all enhanced by high quality interpersonal relationships characterized as open, warm, non-hostile, non-blaming and engaging. Structuring activities include anticriminal modeling and reinforcement, skill building through structured learning, problem solving, advocacy and brokerage, and the effective use of authority (see Principle 16, staff considerations).

Principle 10 -- Specific responsivity and strengths

Specific responsivity factors include personality, ability, motivation, strengths, age, gender, ethnicity/race, language, and various barriers to successful participation in service. The personality set, for example, includes interpersonal anxiety (avoid heavy confrontation), interpersonal and cognitive immaturity (use structured approaches), psychopathy (keep very open communication among all workers) and low verbal intelligence (be concrete). Motivational considerations suggest matching treatment style and goals with level of motivation for change (from not even thinking of change though currently involved in change activities). The relationship principle noted under general responsivity is widely applicable but many feminist scholars stress in particular quality of interpersonal interactions in working with female offenders. Aboriginal writers support the introduction of a spiritual component when working with Aboriginal offenders. When working with reluctant cases the general rule of high quality interpersonal inter-actions is underscored as is the removal of concrete barriers such as inconvenient timing and location of service. Make use of personal, interpersonal and circumstantial strengths in planning and delivering service. Some of these helpful strengths are problem-solving skills, respect for family, a particularly prosocial friend or being happily employed in delivering effective service.

Principle 11 -- Assess responsivity and strength factors

Sophisticated assessment instruments are available for assessment of some of the personality factors and a new generation of risk/need scales are introducing routine assessment of strength and other responsivity factors. Generally, however, watch for particular strengths and for particular barriers for individual cases and for particular groups such as women and minorities.

Principle 12 -- After care, structured follow-up, continuity of care, and relapse prevention

This is introduced as a principle on its own because of the need to stress ongoing monitoring of progress and to intervene when circumstances deteriorate or positive opportunities emerge. Generally, and particularly for residential programs, it is important that programming be community oriented and attend to family, associates and other social settings. Going beyond Principle 4, Principle 12 stresses specific and structured after care and follow-up activity and requires co-ordination of applications of all of the previous principles. At a minimum, in the tradition of relapse prevention, high-risk situations and circumstances are identified and low-risk alternative responses are practiced.

Principle 13 -- Professional discretion

In a few cases, with documented reasons, deviations from the general principles may be introduced. For example, for some young people and their families, it may be recommended that facilitating a move out of a particular apartment building in a particularly high crime area is a priority intermediate goal. Similarly, a major mental disorder such as schizophrenia may move from the minor risk set to the major set when specific symptoms include antisocial thoughts that others are out to get the person and should be “got” first.

Principle 14

Create and record a service plan and any modification of plans through re-assessment of risk/need and progress. The service plan describes how the human service principles of risk, need, general responsivity, specific responsivity, multimodal service, aftercare and professional discretion will be addressed in working with a particular case.

IMPLEMENTATION AND PROGRAM INTEGRITY

Principle 15 -- Integrity in program implementation and delivery

Integrity has to do with whether the human service activities were introduced and delivered as planned and designed, and indeed whether the delivery of services achieved intermediate objectives. Integrity is enhanced when a highly specific and concrete version of a rational and empirically sound theory is employed. Specificity enhances the opportunity for clarity in who is being served, what is being targeted, and what style, mode and strategy of service is to be used. Specificity readily yields the production of training and program manuals in printed, taped or other formats. Integrity is enhanced when workers are selected, trained, and clinically supervised with particular reference to the attitudes and skills required for effective service delivery. Integrity is enhanced when the clinical supervisor has been trained and has access to highly relevant consultation services. In addition, specificity implies an understanding of when treatment comes to an appropriate end or an understanding of the appropriate closing of the case. The latter implies that service personnel and researchers know when dosage has been adequate and/or when treatment has been delivered successfully and/or when intermediate targets have been achieved. Thus, integrity may be enhanced through the monitoring of service process and monitoring of the achievement of intermediate objectives. At the highest levels of integrity, when clinical supervision or other styles of monitoring identify problematic circumstances (or unanticipated service opportunities) actions are initiated to modify the service plan and to overcome barriers and build on strengths. Involvement of researchers in the design and/or delivery of service amplifies integrity. In summary and in checklist format, integrity depends upon all of the following:

1. Specific version of a rational and empirically sound theory
2. Selection of workers
3. Training of workers
4. Clinical supervision of workers
5. Trained clinical supervisors
6. Consultation services for clinical supervisors
7. Printed/taped program manuals
8. Monitoring of intermediate service process
9. Monitoring of intermediate change
10. Action to maximize adherence to service process and enhance appropriate intermediate gain
11. Adequate dosage/duration/intensity
12. Involve a researcher in the design, delivery and evaluation of service -- in particular, involve a researcher interested in service process, intermediate outcome and ultimate outcome in the design and delivery of service.
13. Other

Implementation and integrity issues involve staff and management issues to such a degree that their importance is underscored through statements of separate principles of staff and management considerations.

Principle 16 -- Attend to Staff

The selection, training and clinical supervision of staff each best reflect the particular attitudes, skills and circumstances that are supportive of the delivery of the service as planned. Reflecting the general social learning and general responsivity principles, staff skill and cognition supportive of effective practice fall into the five general core practice categories of relationship/interaction skills, structuring/contingency skills, personal cognitive supportive of human service, social support for the delivery of clinically appropriate service, and other considerations.

Relationship. Indicators of relationship skills include some combination of the following: being respectful, open, warm (not cold, hostile, indifferent), caring, non-blaming, flexible, reflective, self confident, mature, enthusiastic, understanding, genuine (real), bright and verbal, and other indicators including elements of motivational interviewing strategies (express empathy, avoid argumentation, roll with resistance). Recall from the general responsivity principle that the effectiveness of modelling, reinforcement and even expressions of disapproval are all enhanced in the context of high quality interpersonal relationships.

Structuring. Indicators of structuring skills include some combination of the following social learning/cognitive behavioural strategies reformulated with particular reference to core effective practices. Modelling anticriminal alternatives to procriminal attitudes, values, beliefs, rationalizations, thoughts, feelings and behavioural patterns; anticriminal differential reinforcement; cognitive restructuring; structured learning skills; the practice and training of problem solving skills; core advocacy/brokerage activity; and effective use of authority. More generally expressed, some indicators are being directive, solution focused, contingency based and, from motivational interviewing, developing discrepancy and supporting beliefs that the person can change his or behaviour (supporting prosocial self efficacy).

Personal cognitive supports. Some specific indicators including:

• a knowledge base favouring human service activity;
• a belief that offenders can change;
• a belief that core correctional practices work;
• a belief that personally they have the skills to practice at high levels both in terms of relationship and structuring;
• a belief that important others value core practice and value; and
• a belief that reducing recidivism is a worthwhile pursuit.

Social support for effective practice. The two major indicators are association with others who practice and support clinically relevant treatment, and relative isolation from anti-treatment others and from others who promote unstructured, non-directive, client-centered practice and/or isolation from others who promote intensive service for low risk cases and promote the targeting of non-criminogenic needs.

Other. Credentials and other factors will be relevant in so far as they tap into the core practices. Obviously, the area of staff considerations is a major area for future research.

A program scores high on staff considerations when:

1. staff are selected with reference to high level functioning on the relationship, structuring, cognitive and social support dimension of effective correctional practice;
2. staff receive preservice and inservice training that supports high levels of core practice;
3. staff receive on-the-job clinical supervision that is concerned with high level functioning in core practice;
4. staff are actually observed to be functioning at high levels in their exchanges with offenders.

Principle 17 -- Attend to management

Effective managers are assumed to be generally good managers with, additionally, the above-noted relationship and structuring skills along with the knowledge base and their own social sup-port system favourable to clinically relevant and psychologically informed human service. It is management that is responsible for implementing the core principles and creating the supports for creating and maintaining integrity. Effective management will take the steps required to develop program champions inside and outside of the agency. Effective management will reward high functioning staff and have programs and sites accredited.

Principle 18 -- Attending to broader social arrangements

The effective prevention and correctional treatment agency in a public manner will locate crime reduction efforts in the con-text appropriate to local and surrounding conditions. In brief, the correctional agency will be able to clearly locate treatment in locally appropriate contexts of public safety, restorative justice, etc. Similarly, the primary prevention agency will be able to locate their crime prevention efforts in the locally appropriate context of child welfare, family service, mental health, community development, etc.. However, if the host agency is preoccupied with punishment, restoration or child welfare etc. -- if the host agency is not understanding of or interested in clinically relevant approaches to reduced antisocial behaviour -- effectiveness will be reduced.

The endnote supplements the statement of principles with supportive citations, research illustrations and notes on gaps in the research.

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¹ Carleton University, Department of Psychology

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Henggeler, S. W., Schoenwald, S. K., Borduin, C. M., Rowland, M. D., & Cunningham, P. B. (1998). Multisystemic treatment of antisocial behavior in children and adolescents. New York, NY: The Guilford Press.

Hill, J. K., Andrews, D. A., & Hoge, R. D. (1991). Meta-analysis of treatment pro-grams for young offenders: The effect of clinically relevant treatment on recidivism, with controls introduced for various methodological variables. Canadian Journal of Program Evaluation, 6, 97-109.

Izzo, R., & Ross, R. (1990). A meta-analysis of rehabilitation programs for juvenile delinquents: A brief report. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 17, 134-142. Lipsey, M.W. (1989). The efficacy of intervention for juvenile delinquency: Results from 400 studies. Paper presented at the 41st annual meeting of the American Society of Criminology, Reno, Nevada.

Lipsey, M.W. (1992). Juvenile delinquency treatment: A meta-analytic inquiry into the variability of effects. In T. D. Cook, H. Cooper, D. S. Cordray, H. Hartmann, L. V. Hedges, R. J. Light, T. A. Louis, & F. Mosteller (Eds.), Meta-analysis for explanation: A casebook (pp. 83-127). New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation.

Lipsey, M. W. (1995). What do we learn from 400 research studies on the effectiveness of treatment with juvenile delinquents? In J. McGuire (Ed.), What works: Reducing reoffending: Guidelines from research and practice (pp. 63-78). Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons.

Lipsey, M. W. & Wilson D. B. (1997). Effective intervention for serious juvenile offenders: A synthesis of research. A paper prepared for the OJJDP Study Group on Serious and Violent Juvenile Offenders. Vanderbilt University.

Lösel, F. (1995). The efficacy of correctional treatment: A review and synthesis of meta-evaluations. In J. McGuire (Ed.), What works: Reducing reoffending: Guidelines from research and practice (pp. 79-111). Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons.

Lösel, F. (1996). Effective correctional programming: What empirical research tells us and what it doesn't. Forum on Corrections Research, 8 (3), 33-36.

Lösel, F. (1998). The importance of offender programming: German and international evaluations. A paper presented at the International Beyond prisons Symposium, March 15-19, 1998, Donald Gordon Centre, Queen's University, Kingston, ON.

Mayer, J. P., Gensheimer, L. K., Davidson, W. S., & Gottschalk (1986). Social learning treatment within juvenile justice: A meta-analysis of impact in the natural environment. In S. J. Apter & A. Goldstein (Eds.), Youth violence: Programs and prospects. Elmsford, NY: Pergamon.

McGuire, J., & Priestly, P. (1995). Reviewing what works: Past, present and future. In J. McGuire (Ed.), What works: Reducing reoffending -- Guidelines for research and practice (pp 3-34). Chichester, UK.

Palmer, T. (1974, March). The Youth Authority's community treatment project. Federal Probation, 3-14.

Palmer, T. (1975). Martinson revisited. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 12, 133-152.

Patterson, G.R. (1982). Coercive family process. Eugene, OR: Castalia.

Trotter, C. (1999). Working with involuntary clients: A guide to practice. London, UK: Sage Publications.

Van Voorhis, P., Braswell, M., & Lester, D. L. (1997). Correctional counseling and rehabilitation. Cincinnati, OH: Anderson.

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ENDNOTE

Comments, some references and some meta-analytic research findings for principles of effective prevention and correctional treatment

Clinically relevant and psychologically informed human service recognizes the importance of individual differences in criminal behaviour, the major importance of immediate personal and interpersonal factors, the more distal significance of broad structural factors, and the importance of differences in approaches to treatment. For years it has been hypothesized that clinically relevant and psychologically informed correctional treatment services could significantly and meaningfully reduce criminal recidivism rates (Andrews, 1979, 1980, 1982, 1989; Andrews, Bonta, & Hoge, 1990; Gendreau & Ross, 1979, 1987; Grant & Grant 1959; Palmer, 1974, 1975; Warren, 1971). Now, meta-analytic reviews of controlled outcome studies support not only the value of correctional treatment but of clinically and psychologically appropriate treatment in particular (Andrews, 1995a; Andrews & Bonta, 1998: Resource Note 10.1; Andrews, Gordon, Hill, Kurkowsky, & Hoge 1993; Andrews, Zinger, Hoge, Bonta, Gendreau, & Cullen 1990; Antonowicz & Ross 1994; Cleland, Pearson, & Lipton 1996; Garrett, 1985; Hill, Andrews, & Hoge 1991; Izzo & Ross, 1990; Lipsey, 1989, 1992, 1995; Lipsey & Wilson, 1997: Lösel, 1995, 1996, 1998; Mayer, Gensheimer, Davidson, & Gottschalk, 1986). Now, many scholars and practitioners have provided evidence-based guidelines for appropriate service and the level of agreement among the guidelines, while not perfect, is substantial (Andrews, 1995b; Andrews, Bonta, & Hoge, 1990; Gendreau, 1996; McGuire & Priestly, 1995; Lipsey, 1995; Lösel, 1995, 1998; Van Voorhis, Braswell, & Lester, 1997). [from Andrews, Dowden & Gendreau, 1999]

The meta-analytic findings reported herein are based on analyses of the Carleton University data bank (Andrews, Zinger et al., 1990; Andrews, Dowden, & Gendreau, 1999; Dowden, 1998; Dowden & Andrews, 1999). The mean effect sizes reported below may be interpreted as the difference in percentage rate of recidivism between treatment and comparison groups. For example an effect size of 0.20 reflects a recidivism rate of 40% in the treatment group (50 minus 20/2) and 60% in the comparison group (50 plus 20/2). A positive difference reflects relative success in that the mean recidivism rate of the treatment group was lower than that of the comparison group. A negative difference reflects relative failure in that the mean recidivism rate of the comparison group was lower than that of the treatment group. For example, with an effect size of -0.10, the recidivism rate would be 55% in the treatment group (50 plus 10/2) and 45% in the comparison group (50 minus 10/2).

Principles 1 and 2: The general personality and social learning perspective on criminal behaviour and prevention programming is the most promising perspective whether the context is restorative justice, retributive justice, or outside of the justice system, and/or whether the setting is community-based or residential/ custodial. Similarly, the perspective applies across categories of age, gender, race/ethnicity and social class (for examples of these perspectives see: Akers, 1973; Andrews, 1982, 1996; Andrews & Bonta, 1994, 1998; Henggeler et al., 1998; Patterson,1982). Even without applying the clinically relevant and psychologically informed principles, it is obvious from the meta-analyses that programs with an immediate personal and interpersonal focus do much better in terms of reduced reoffending than do programs based on broad social location and/or social reaction perspectives. A mild average reduction in reoffending for personality and social psychological approaches (0.10, k = 325) compares very favourably with the mild mean increase in reoffending found for the more sociological approaches (-0.03, k = 49) and with the mean increase found for deterrence programs intending to increase fear of official punishment (-0.05. k = 43).

Principle 3: The evidence favouring a human service approach in the justice context is now overwhelming. Programs based on retribution, just desert, deterrence, and/or restorative justice by themselves do not yield impressive reductions in reoffending. In the Carleton University sample, the average effect of 101 tests of the effects of increases in the severity of the punishment is a mild increase in recidivism (-0.03, k = 101). This average effect is dismal in comparison with the modestly positive mean effect of 0.12 for human service when offered in the justice context of diversion, community corrections and/or institutional corrections (k = 273). The University of New Brunswick, St John group, (See Chapter 3 of this Compendium) looked even more closely at the effects of sanctions and the findings are devastating for those who emphasize retribution, deterrence, restoration and/or diversion without the delivery of human service. The aver-age effect of community sanctions (in 140 tests involving over 50,000 offenders) was zero (ranging from -0.07 for scared straight through 0.04 for fines). The average effect of incarceration relative to a community sanction was -0.07 (k = 103, N = 267,804) and the average effect of more vs less custodial time was -0.03 (k = 222, N = 68,248). Please note that the studies of incarceration did not include estimates of incapacitation effects and hence the already mild mean negative effects on reoffending may be overestimating the negative effects.

Principle 4: The meta-analytic evidence in regard to community-based programming suggests that the principles of effective human service are best introduced before the research findings relevant to community settings are reviewed.

Principle 5: Support for the risk principle is now moderate to strong. The support increases as you move up from studies of the effects of sanctions through studies of human service in general to studies of human service that is consistent with the need and general responsivity principles. The average effect of criminal sanctions is mildly negative with low risk cases (-0.05, k = 34) and with higher risk cases (-0.02, k = 256). The mean effect of human service, however, is much more positive with higher risk cases (0.14, k = 211) than with lower risk cases (0.07, k = 62). When the human service is in adherence with the need and/or general responsivity principles, the effects of risk become quite substantial. For example, with adherence to need, the mean effect of service is 0.19 (k = 169) for higher risk cases compared to -0.01 (205) for lower risk cases. The comparable figures with adherence to general responsivity are 0.23 (77) and 0.04 (297) for higher and lower risk cases respectively.

Our understanding of the risk principle, however, is still limited by the relatively few studies that actually report separate effects for the lower and higher risk cases. Still more limited is knowledge of treatment effects among the lowest, low, middle, high, and very high-risk cases (including psychopaths).

Principles 6 and 7: Support for the need principles increased dramatically with the completion of Dowden's (1998) MA thesis (Andrews, Dowden, & Gendreau, 1999). Using the Andrews and Bonta (1994, 1998; Andrews, 1989) classification of more promising and less promising targets (that is, their lists of criminogenic and non-criminogenic needs) there was a clear association between the number of criminogenic needs targeted and reduced recidivism (0.55, k = 374). In dramatic contrast, the effect sizes decreased with the number of non-criminogenic needs targeted (-0.18, k =374). This dramatic difference underscores that the multimodal principle refers only to increases in the number of criminogenic needs targeted -- increases in the number of non-criminogenic needs targeted contribute to reduced effect sizes. Indeed, the mean effect sizes were negative when the number of non-criminogenic needs targeted exceeded the number of criminogenic needs. The mean effect sizes increased directly with how many criminogenic needs targeted exceeded the number of non-criminogenic needs. When the number of non-criminogenic needs targeted were subtracted from the number of criminogenic needs the difference scores ranged from -3 to +6 across 374 tests of treatment. The corresponding mean effect sizes were as follows for the difference scores of -3 through plus 6: -07 (-3, k = 9), -05 (-2, k = 14), -0.00 (-1, k = 93), -0.00 (0, k = 91), 0.14 (1, k = 71), 0.19 (2, k = 27), 0.22 (3, k = 40), 0.25 (4, k = 17), 0.32 (5, k = 7), 0.51 (6, k = 5). Our simple measure for exploration of principle 6 was a difference score of 1 or more compared to a difference score of 0 or less. The corresponding mean effect sizes were 0.19 (k = 169) and -0.01 (k = 205).

As strong as the above-noted findings may be there are serious limitations and gaps in knowledge. Ultimately, what is required are experimental investigations in which the effects of treatment on recidivism can be shown to be reduced through statistical controls for measured changes in the needs targeted. Currently there are very few studies that allow such explorations. Similarly, experimental tests of some types of need with some types of cases have rarely been conducted. For example, experimental tests of programs that target the low self-esteem of women offenders are so rare that we have yet to find a single one. Similarly, tests of particular dynamic risk factors in programs focusing upon sex offending and other types of violent offending are few in number.

Principle 9: Support for social learning and cognitive behavioural influence strategies is readily found in all but one of the meta-analyses of the effects of correctional treatment. The Carleton University meta-analyses have supported the principle of general responsivity in re-analyses of the studies reviewed by the one negative review as well as in three additional sets of tests of treatment. Overall, the mean effect size in 77 tests of social learning/cognitive behavioural strategies was 0.23 (k = 77) compared with 0.04 for 297 tests of other intervention strategies. The general responsivity principle has also been stated with reference to the relationship and structuring aspects of correctional treatment. Research on these statements of general responsivity are presented in the comments on the staff principle (Principle 16).

Principles 3, 5, 6, 7, and 9 in combination: The findings are very clear. Mean effect size increases directly with adherence to the principles of human service, risk, need and general responsivity. The average effect size for tests of criminal sanctions without the delivery of human service and tests of human service that adhered to not one of risk, need and responsivity was -0.02 (k = 124). The mean effect size for human service pro-grams that adhered to at least one of risk, need and general responsivity was equally as unimpressive at 0.02 (k = 106). Human service programs adhering to at least two of the principles of clinically relevant and psychologically informed human service yielded a mean effect size of 0.18 (k = 84). Adherence to all three of the human service principles yielded a mean effect size of 0.26 (k = 60). The evidence suggests that adherence to the principles of clinically relevant and psychologically informed human service is rewarded by substantial reductions in recidivism.

Principle 10: In brief, a meta-analytic review of specific responsivity is required and additional primary studies of differential treatment are required. Few question the idea that treatment strategies are best matched with case characteristics, and yet studies of recidivism rates as a function of variation in both case characteristics and treatment strategies are so few that conclusions are not yet possible from the meta-analyses. Interestingly, 12 tests of treatment did target particular barriers to treatment and an above-average mean effect size was found.

Principles 8 and 11: The human service principles of risk, need and responsivity are of particular importance because the findings of assessments now may be linked directly with the practical decisions required when clinicians and managers wish to maximize the positive effects of treatment. Note that assessments of risk may now be used not to justify enhanced punishment and control but to guide the intensity of human service efforts. Assessments of criminogenic need identify the appropriate intermediate targets of service and responsivity assessments suggest individualized treatment strategies. Discussions of reliable and valid assessment instruments may be found in Gendreau, Little, and Goggin (1996) and Andrews and Bonta (1998).

Principle 12: This principle emphasizes the value of after care, structured follow-up, continuity of care, and a community orientation through an emphasis on relapse prevention. Elements of a relapse prevention orientation were evident in only 18 of the tests of treatment but those few tests did yield an above average mean effect size. A community-based focus was associated with enhanced effect sizes as evidenced by the findings supportive of targeting associates, family and school/work (the need principle).

Principles 13 and 14: To date, the principles of professional discretion and case planning/recording have not been explored through meta-analytic summaries of links with the effects of treatment. However, emerging studies with the Correctional Program Assessment Inventory (Andrews, 1995c; Gendreau & Goggin, 1997) are showing that ongoing programs that have implemented systematic risk/need assessment and reveal adherence to the principle present promising recidivism rates. Ongoing CPAI research also speaks to Principle 15.

Principle 15: Meta-analytic tests of implementation and integrity are generally supportive of the importance of theoretical specificity, staff selection, training and supervision, printed/taped training or skill manuals, small program units (as inferred from small sample studies), involvement of researcher, and duration of service (Andrews & Dowden, under review). Monitoring of service process and/or intermediate change was not found to link with effect size. The value of consultation services for clinical supervisors is unexplored. A weakness in this literature is that programs with indications of integrity tend also to be among the best representatives of clinically relevant and psychologically informed treatment. With integrity and clinically appropriate treatment so highly correlated, it is difficult to show that integrity greatly enhances effect size. It, however, is know that indicators of integrity are unrelated to outcome when treatment is clinically inappropriate. In other words, there is no meta-analytic evidence at all that introducing clinically inappropriate treatment with high levels of integrity is of any value. There are two great needs in this area: an increase in the number of primary studies focusing on implementation and integrity, and increased attention to reporting on integrity in all controlled outcome studies.

Principles 16, 17, and 18. Scoring of the selection, training and clinical supervision of staff becomes moves beyond general integrity (Principle 15) so that the issue becomes selection, training and supervision with particular reference to the demands of the general responsivity principle. Recall, according to general social learning theory (Andrews, 1980; Andrews & Bonta, 1998) and general social learning influence strategies (Andrews, 1979; Andrews & Carvell, 1998), two dimensions are crucial. The two dimensions are quality of the interpersonal relationship and the structuring skills of the worker. Without evidence that staff were selected according to relationship or structuring skills, the mean effect size was 0.05 based on the vast majority of the tests of treatment (k = 327). However, when one or both of the core dimensions were considered, the mean effect sizes varied from 0.25 to 0.36 (k = 47 in total).

Specific elements of structuring in practice yielded mean effect sizes of 0.31 for high level reinforcement (k = 15), 0.30 for high levels of clinically appropriate disapproval (k = 8), 0.30 for structured skill training (k = 38), 0.28 for clinically appropriate modeling (k = 37), 0.26 for clinically appropriate use of authority (k = 15), 0.25 for problem solving (k = 45), and 0.13 for advocacy brokerage (k = 53). Coding according to core correctional practices (CCP) now constitutes an enhanced coding of general responsivity. In the future, the elements of CCP, soon to also include elements of motivational interviewing and cognitive restructuring, may be scored as selection factors, training factors, clinical supervision factors, and as observed elements of treatment process.

The general applicability of these elements of effective practice have been underscored by Trotter (1999) who has produced a model of social work practice with involuntary clients. He focuses on role clarification (authority), pro-social model-ling and reinforcement, problem solving and relationship.

Two additional staff considerations follow directly from a general personality and social learning perspective on human behaviour. Staff performance on indicators of clinically relevant practice would reflect their relevant skills, behavioural history and personal predispositions. Additionally, performance reflects cognitive supportive of such practice and social support for clinically relevant practice. These two factors remain virtually unexplored.

Research that links management concerns and broader social arrangements to actual impact on recidivism is lacking.

We all look forward to an expanded set of principles with stronger research support. Personally, I think that some major advances are soon going to come from studies of female offenders, aboriginal offenders, treatment in restorative justice contexts, treatment in forensic mental health contexts, and primary prevention in non-justice children's and family services. The intellectual energy and expanding public support for experimentation in those areas is very impressive and very promising.

 

CHAPTER 3

The Effects of Community Sanctions and Incarceration on Recidivism

PAUL GENDREAU and CLAIRE GOGGIN¹
FRANCIS T. CULLEN²
DONALD A. ANDREWS³

Within recent years “get tough” strategies have become the latest panacea for dealing with offenders (see Cullen & Gendreau, 2000). This chapter quantitatively summarizes a substantial body of literature that assesses the effectiveness of two types of “get tough” programs; community sanctions and incarceration. A brief history of the development of these initiatives is provided accompanied by a meta-analytic summary of the data.

COMMUNITY SANCTIONS

At one time, some of the services provided in probation and parole settings adhered to a dynamic rehabilitative model wherein it was gratifying to discover well-conceptualized programs of sound therapeutic integrity (Gendreau, Paparozzi, Little, & Goddard, 1993). Reductions in recidivism of 20% to 60% were reported for some of these programs. In addition, employment and educational activities increased threefold in several studies (see Ross & Gendreau, 1980; Gendreau, 1996).

What kinds of programs were these? First, treatment staff conformed to the principles and techniques of the therapies they were employing. Secondly, staff was carefully monitored by the program developers who themselves had excellent skills in behavioural treatment and their assessments, with ongoing training frequently provided. Thirdly, offenders' individual differences relative to varying styles of service delivery were considered. Finally, the programs were intense; contact between offenders and therapist was frequent and focussed on learning pro-social skills.

The following three programs best illustrate the above. The first of these, by Walter and Mills (1980), was a behavioural employment program for juvenile probationers utilizing a token economy, contingency contracting, and life skills interventions. The program was admirable in that its treatment design intimately linked the courts with community-based employers who were trained as paraprofessional behaviour modifiers. The second example came from Andrews and Kiessling's (1980) Canadian Volunteers in Corrections Program that combined professionals with paraprofessionals in an adult probation super-vision program. The major features of the counselling and supervision practices were the use of authority, anti-criminal modelling and reinforcement, and problem-solving techniques.

The quality of interpersonal relationships was also considered when pairing offenders with probation and parole officers. The theoretical importance of this study should not be under-stated as the treatment guidelines employed herein were instrumental to the continuing development of the principles of effective correctional treatment literature (e.g., Andrews, 1995; Gendreau & Ross, 1983-1984).

Thirdly, there was a series of studies by Davidson and colleagues (Blakely, Davidson, Saylor, & Robinson, 1980; Davidson & Robinson, 1975; Seidman, Rappaport, & Davidson, 1980) that featured an amalgam of behavioural techniques, relationships skills training, child advocacy, and matching of offenders and therapists. As community psychologists, they were among the first researchers to be aware of the need to overcome system-based barriers in delivering effective interventions.

Just when it seemed, however, that progress was being made in the confirmation and promulgation of effective services for probation and parole, a counterrevolution began to evolve: the new epoch of punishment-based strategies (Martinson, 1976). The reasons why this new epoch gained favour is reviewed elsewhere (Cullen & Gendreau, 2000). With the exception of occasional reports of successful intervention program in probation and parole (e.g., Davidson, Redner, Blakely, Mitchell, & Emshoff, 1987; Ross, Fabiano, & Ewles, 1988), distinct forms of “get tough” strategies known as intermediate sanctions began to proliferate in probation and parole settings. The term “intermediate” was derived from the notion that deterrence strategies based on excessive use of incarceration were too crude and expensive while regular probation (with or without treatment services), on the other hand, was too “soft”. Interestingly, some proponents of intermediate sanctions asserted that probation could be even more punishing than prison (Petersilia, 1990). The most common form of intermediate sanction was Intensive Supervision Programming (ISP). As Billie J. Erwin so forcefully put it when referring to the Georgia ISP, considered by many to be a model for the United States: “... We are in the business of increasing the heat on probationers... satisfying the public's demand for just punishment...criminals must be punished for their misdeeds” (Erwin, 1986, p. 17).

This new generation of ISPs quickly spread throughout the United States, and to a much lesser extent, within Canada. They turned up the heat by: greatly increasing contact between supervisors and offenders, confining offenders to their homes, enforcing curfews, submitting offenders to random drug testing, requiring offenders to pay restitution to victims, electronically monitoring offenders, and requiring offenders to pay for the privilege of being supervised. Most ISPs have employed arbitrary combinations of the above sanction types in varying degrees with the major emphasis for most being an increase in the frequency of offender-probation/parole contacts. Boot camps and quick/brief arrests or citations, often in response to spousal abuse offences, are other types of sanctions that may fall under the intermediate sanctions umbrella.

Besides serving an underlying retributive purpose and reducing prison overcrowding costs, an important expectation was that ISPs would effect pro-social conformity through the threat of punishment (Gendreau, Cullen, & Bonta, 1994).

How well are intermediate sanctions working? So far they appear to be “widening the net” by targeting low-risk offenders who would normally receive periods of regular probation. The data indicate that the use of intermediate sanctions can increase the number of technical violations and lead to higher rates of incarceration (Gendreau, Goggin, & Fulton, 2001). As to recidivism, we found little evidence of the effectiveness of intermediate sanctions among this sample of studies. Table 3.1 illustrates these results. Of note, a positive correlation indicates that the sanction was associated with an increase in recidivism while a negative correlation means the sanction has suppressed or decreased recidivism. Within Category 1, ISPs, there were 47 comparisons of the recidivism rates of offenders in an ISP with those receiving regular probation. These comparisons involved 19,403 offenders with a mean treatment effect of 0.00, expressed as a phi coefficient (Φ), indicating no difference in percentage recidivism rates between the two groups. The recidivism rate for each of the ISP and comparison groups was 29%.

The confidence interval (CI) is a useful index of the likelihood that a given range of values will contain the “true” population parameter. In the case of ISPs, the CI about Φ is -0.05 to 0.05, reflecting recidivism rates ranging from a 5 per cent reduction (Φ = -0.05) to a 5 per cent increase (Φ = 0.05). Also of note, when the CI contains 0, one can infer a lack of significant treatment effects (p>0.05).

The z^± value is a weighted estimate of Φ. That is, each effect size is weighted by the inverse of its variance (√N – 3½ ) thereby giving more emphasis to effect sizes generated with larger sample sizes. The z^± for ISPs indicates that they were associated with a 6% increase in recidivism with an associated CI of 0.04 to 0.07.

Upon examining the mean Φ and z^± values for each of the eight types of intermediate sanctions, one can see that 13 of the 16 CIs contain 0. Only in the case of restitution and fines was there any indication of a suppression of recidivism (i.e., CI did not include 0) but these results were criterion-dependent. A summary of the data from all of the eight categories produced mean effect sizes of 0.00 (CI_Φ = -0.02 to 0.03) and 0.02 for z^± (CI z^± = 0.01 to 0.03).

In fact, an examination of the effect sizes from intermediate sanctions that purported to provide a modicum of “treatment” -- in each case the treatment was ill-defined and, therefore, impossible to assess as to quality -- an interesting result was uncovered. The addition of a treatment component produced a 10% reduction in recidivism. On this evidence, one can tentatively conclude that the effectiveness of intermediate sanctions is mediated through the provision of treatment.

Table 3.1 Mean effect of community sanctions on recidivism
Type of Sanction (k)		N	%E	%C	MΦ	CIΦ	z±	CIz±
1.	Intensive Supervision Programs (47)	19,403	29	29	0.00	-0.05 to 0.05	0.06	0.04 to 0.07
2.	Arrest (24)	7,779	38	39	0.01	-0.05 to 0.04	0.00	-0.02 to 0.02
3.	Fines (18)	7,162	41	45	-0.04	-0.08 to 0.00	-0.04	-0.06 to -0.02
4.	Restitution (17)	8,715	39	40	-0.02	-0.15 to -0.01	0.03	-0.01 to 0.05
5.	Boot Camp (13)	6,831	31	30	0.00	-0.05 to 0.08	0.00	-0.02 to 0.02
6.	Scared Straight (12)	1,891	46	37	0.07	-0.05 to 0.18	0.04	-0.01 to 0.09
7.	Drug Testing (3)	419	13	12	0.05	-0.12 to 0.12	0.00	-0.10 to 0.10
8.	Electronic Monitoring (6)	1,414	6	4	0.05	-0.02 to 0.11	0.03	-0.02 to 0.08
9.	Total (140)	53,614	33	33	0.00	-0.02 to 0.03	0.02	-0.01 to 0.03
Note. k = number of effect sizes per type of sanction; N= total sample size per type of sanction; %E = percentage recidivism for the group receiving the sanction; %C = percentage recidivism for the comparison group (regular probation); MΦ = mean phi per type of sanction; CIΦ = confidence interval about mean phi; z± = weighted estimation of phi per type of sanction; CIz± = confidence interval about z±.

 

INCARCERATION

The view that the experience of prison in itself acts as a deter-rent has a long history in criminal justice (Cullen & Gendreau, 2000). It is rooted in specific deterrence theory (Andenaes, 1968), which predicts that individuals experiencing a more severe sanction are more likely to reduce their criminal activities in the future. Indeed, both the public and many policy-makers assume incarceration has powerful deterrent effects (DeJong, 1997; Doob, Sprott, Marinos, & Varma, 1998; Spelman, 1995; van Voorhis, Browning, Simon, & Gordon, 1997). Amongst academics, economists have taken the lead in support of the specific deterrence model (see von Hirsch, Bottoms, Burney, & Wikström, 1999). They maintain that incarceration imposes direct and indirect costs on inmates (e.g., loss of income, stigmatization) (Nagin, 1998; Orsagh & Chen, 1988) such that, faced with the prospect of going to prison or after having experienced prison life, the rational individual would choose not to engage in further criminal activities.

What kind of data is used to support the hypothesis that prison time suppresses criminal behaviour? The most compelling evidence comes from some ecological studies where the results are based on rates or averages (aggregate data). An example of one of the most positive results come from a study by Fabelo (1995) that reported a 30% increase in incarceration rates across 50 U.S. states, corresponding with a decrease of 5% in the crime rate for a five-year period. Fabelo's data has been interpreted as convincing evidence that prisons deter crime (Reynolds, 1996).

To be fair to deterrence aficionados, we must acknowledge that there are a number of caveats about the potency of prison in this regard. These include the following: deterrent effects are more likely to be found among lower risk offenders, harsher prison living conditions, and aggregate data which tend to wildly inflate results in favour of deterrence (for a detailed review see Gendreau, Goggin, & Cullen, 1999).

To return to the original question as to whether longer periods of incarceration are associated with reductions in recidivism, we examined two sets of data that addressed the above-noted caveats. We located 222 comparisons of groups of offenders = 68,248) who spent more (an average of 30 months) versus less (an average of 17 months) time in prison. The groups were similar on approximately one to five risk factors. As seen in Table 3.2, offenders who did more time had slight increases in recidivism of 3% or 2% depending on whether the effect sizes were unweighted (Φ) or weighted (z^±).

The second sample involved 103 comparisons of 267,804 offenders who were either sent to prison for brief periods (only 19% of effect sizes noted length of incarceration) or received a community-based sanction. Once again, the results from Table 3.2 indicate no deterrent effect. Using Φ as a measure of out-come, we see an increase in recidivism of 7% but no effect (0%) when effect size is weighted by sample size.

Table 3.2 Mean phi (Φ) and mean weighted phi (z±) for more vs. less and incarceration vs. community Sanctions
Type of Sanction (k)		N	MΦ(SD)	CIΦ	z±	CI z±
1.	More vs. Less (222)a	68,248	0.03(.1 1)	0.02 to 0.05	0.03	0.02 to 0.04
2.	Incarceration vs. Community (103)b	267,804	0.07(.12)	0.05 to 0.09	0.00	0.00 to 0.00
3.	Total (325)	336,052	0.04(.12)	0.03 to 0.06	0.02	0.02 to 0.02
Note. k = number of effect sizes per type of sanction; N = total sample size per type of sanction; MΦ(SD)= mean phi and standard deviation per type of sanction; CIΦ = confidence interval about mean phi; z± = weighted estimation of Φ per type of sanction; CIz± = confidence about z±. a More vs. Less -- mean prison time in months (k = 190) : More = 30.0 months, Less = 12.9 months, Difference = 17.2 months. b Incarceration vs. Community -- mean prison time in months (k = 19): 10.5 months.

Clearly, the prison as deterrent hypothesis is not supported. The opposite conclusion, and one that is widely endorsed in some correctional circles, is that prisons do increase recidivism, in other words act as “schools for crime”. This is problematic in our view. The studies in this database are lacking a great deal of essential information, moreover, the design strength of many of the comparison groups left much be desired, although we found no correlation between quality of design and effect size (Φ). Nevertheless, while this is the “best” available evidence with which to assess the enthusiastic claims of prison deterrence sup-porters, the only really satisfactory answer to this particular question is for prison authorities to periodically assess incarcerates on a comprehensive list of dynamic risk factors and correlate time served and changes in risk while incarcerated with future recidivism. This will prove, by far, to be the most sensitive analysis. Regrettably, evaluations of this type have rarely been reported in the corrections literature (e.g., Gendreau, Grant, Leipciger, 1979; Wormith, 1984; Zamble & Porporino, 1990).

In summary, the addition of this body of evidence to the “what works” debate leads to the inescapable conclusion that, when it comes to reducing individual offender recidivism, the “only game in town” is appropriate cognitive-behavioural treatments which embody known principles of effective intervention (Andrews, Dowden, & Gendreau, 1999; for reviews see Cullen & Gendreau, 2000; Gendreau, Smith, & Goggin, 2001).

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¹ University of New Brunswick, Centre for Criminal Justice Studies

² University of Cincinnati, Division of Criminal Justice

³ Carleton University, Department of Psychology

⁴ For the interested reader, please consult Gendreau et al. (1999) plus forthcoming work that reports on this data in much greater detail.

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REFERENCES

Andenaes, J. (1968). Does punishment deter crime? Criminal Law Quarterly, 11, 76-93.

Andrews, D. A. (1995). The psychology of criminal conduct and effective treatment. In J. McGuire (Ed.), What works: Reducing reoffending (pp. 35-62). West Sussex, UK: John Wiley.

Andrews, D. A., Dowden, C., & Gendreau, P. (1999). Clinically relevant and psychologically informed app roaches to reduced reoffending: A meta-analytic study of human service, risk, need, responsivity, and other concerns in justice contexts. Unpublished manuscript, Ottawa, ON: Carleton University.

Andrews, D. A., & Kiessling, J. J. (1980). Program structure and effective correctional practice: A summary of CaVic research. In R. Ross & P. Gendreau (Eds.), Effective correctional treatment (pp. 439-463). Toronto, ON: Butterworths.

Blakely, C. H., Davidson, W. S., II, Saylor, C. A., & Robinson, M. J. (1980). Kentfields rehabilitation program: Ten years later. In R. R. Ross & P. Gendreau (Eds.), Effective correctional treatment (pp. 3 19-326). Toronto, ON: Butterworths.

Cullen, F. T., & Gendreau, P. (1989). The effectiveness of correctional treatment: Reconsidering the ‘nothing works' debate. In L. Goodstein & D. L. MacKenzie (Eds.), The American prison: Issues in research and policy (pp. 23-44). New York, NY: Plenum.

Cullen, F. T., & Gendreau, P. (2000). Assessing correctional rehabilitation: Policy, practice, and prospects. In J. Horney (Ed.), NIJ criminal justice 2000: Changes in decision making and discretion in the criminal justice system (pp. 109-175). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice.

Davidson, W. S., II, Redner, R., Blakely, C., Mitchell, C., & Emshoff, J. (1987). Diversion of juvenile offenders: An experimental comparison. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 55, 68-75.

Davidson, W. S., II, & Robinson, M. J. (1975). Community psychology and behavior modification: A community based program for the prevention of delinquency. Journal of Corrective Psychiatry and Behavior Therapy, 21, 1-12.

DeJong, C. (1997). Survival analysis and specific deterrence: Integrating theoretical and empirical models of recidivism. Criminology, 35, 561-575.

Doob, A. N., Sprott, J. B., Marinos, V., & Varma, K. N.(1998). An exploration of Ontario residents' views of crime and the criminal justice system (C98-93 1656-4). Toronto, ON: University of Toronto, Centre of Criminology.

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Fabelo, T. (1995). Testing the case for more incarceration in Texas: The record so far. State of Texas: Criminal Justice Policy Council.

Gendreau, P. (1996). The principles of effective intervention with offenders. In F. X. Harland, (Ed.), Choosing correctional options that work: Defining the demand and evaluating the supply (pp. 117-130). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Gendreau, P., Cullen, F. T., & Bonta, J. (1994). Intensive rehabilitation super-vision: The next generation in community corrections? Federal Probation, 58, 72-78.

Gendreau, P., Goggin, C., & Cullen, F. (1999). The effects of prison sentences on recidivism. Ottawa, ON: Solicitor General Canada.

Gendreau, P., Goggin, C., & Fulton, B. (2001). Intensive supervision in probation and parole. In C. R. Hollin (Ed.), Handbook of offender assessment and treatment (pp. 195-204). Chichester, UK: John Wiley.

Gendreau, P., Grant, B., & Leipciger, M. (1979). Self-esteem, incarceration and recidivism. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 6, 67-75.

Gendreau, P., Paparozzi, M., Little, T., & Goddard, M. (1993). Does “punishing smarter” work? An assessment of the new generation of alternative sanctions in probation. Forum on Corrections Research, 5(3), 3 1-34.

Gendreau, P., & Ross, R. R. (1983-84). Correctional treatment: Some recommendations for successful intervention. Juvenile and Family Court ,34, 31-40.

Gendreau, P., Smith, P., & Goggin, C. (2001). Treatment programs in corrections. In J. Winterdyk (Ed.), Corrections in Canada: Social reaction to crime (pp. 238-265). Scarborough, ON: Prentice-Hall.

Martinson, R. (1976). California and the crossroads. In R. Martinson, T. Palmer & S. Adams (Eds.). Rehabilitation, recidivism and research (pp. 63-74). Hackensack, NJ: National Council on Crime and Delinquency.

Nagin, D. S. (1998). Criminal deterrence research at the outset of the twenty-first century. In M. Tonry (Ed.), Crime and justice: A review of research (vol. 23, pp. 1-42). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Orsagh, T., & Chen, J.-R. (1988). The effect of time served on recidivism: An interdisciplinary theory. Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 4, 155-171.

Petersilia, J. (1990). When probation becomes more dreaded than prison. Federal Probation, 54, 23-27.

Reynolds, M. O. (1996). Crime and punishment in Texas: Update (NCPA Policy Report No. 202). Dallas, TX: National Center for Policy Analysis.

Ross, R. R., Fabiano, E., & Ewles, C. (1988). Reasoning and rehabilitation. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 32, 29-35.

Ross, R. R., & Gendreau, P. (1980). Effective correctional treatment. Toronto, ON: Butterworths.

Seidman, E., Rappaport, J., & Davidson, W. S., II. (1980). Adolescents in legal jeopardy: Initial success and replication of an alternative to the criminal justice system. In R. R. Ross & P. Gendreau (Eds), Effective correctional treatment (pp. 101-126). Toronto, ON: Butterworths.

Spelman, W. (1995). The severity of intermediate sanctions. Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 32, 107-135.

Van Voorhis, P., Browning, S. L., Simon, M., & Gordon, J. (1997). The meaning of punishment: Inmates' orientation to the prison experience. The Prison Journal, 77, 135-167.

von Hirsch, A., Bottoms, A. E., Burney, E., & Wikström, P.-O (1999). Criminal deterrence and sentence severity: An analysis of recent research. Oxford, UK: Hart Publishing.

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Wormith, J. S. (1984). Attitude and behavior change of correctional clientele: A three year follow-up. Criminology, 22, 595-6 18.

Zamble, E. & Porporino, F. J. (1990). Coping with imprisonment. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 17, 53-70.

 

CHAPTER 4

Offender Assessment: General Issues and Considerations

JAMES BONTA¹

There are few activities in corrections as important as the assessment of offenders. An accurate assessment facilitates the fair, efficient and ethical classification of offenders. A failure to conduct a proper assessment can lead to serious consequences. An inmate can be placed within an inadequate security setting and subsequently escapes; a Parole Board mistakenly releases an offender who was thought not to present a danger; and a parole officer fails to recognize a parolee's deteriorating situation. These are but a few examples that illustrate the importance of offender assessment.

In general, the assessment of offenders has centred on issues related to security and release. Without a doubt, the assessment of risk is very important for corrections. However, there is an under-standing that offender risk assessment is also related to effective treatment. This is a recent development. Conducting an offender assessment has always been the first step toward offender treatment. But, rarely has offender assessment for treatment purposes been considered in the context of risk. Usually, assessments for treatment planning were conducted in the context of assessing offender needs. We are currently seeing a convergence in thinking about offender assessment that bridges the traditional concerns of safety and security and offender rehabilitation.

This chapter presents an overview of what we know about offender risk assessment. The review will also extend beyond the prediction of an offender's risk to reoffend. It includes a discussion of the risk and needs assessments that underlie effective treatment. We begin with a discussion of how our understanding of criminal behaviour influences our approach to offender assessments. After reviewing different explanations of criminal behaviour, the research seems to support a general personality and social psychological perspective. This perspective leads us to a number of useful ideas and practices. It not only increases predictive accuracy but it also highlights the relevance of dynamic risk factors or criminogenic needs. The identification of dynamic risk factors is critical for assessment approaches that improve the treatment of offenders.

HOW WE THINK ABOUT OFFENDERS INFLUENCES ASSESSMENT

Almost everyone has an explanation as to why certain individuals break the law. Although these explanations make interesting social conversation, there are people who devote careers out of explaining criminal behaviour. Criminologists, sociologists, psychiatrists and psychologists think about what may cause crime and formulate theories of criminal behaviour. They then search for evidence in support of their theories. The findings generated from research studies are used to modify the theories, and some-times to discount them.

Opening any introductory criminology textbook will reveal numerous theories or explanations of criminal behaviour. For our purposes, it is unnecessary to review each single theory and the evidence for them. Most theories of criminal behaviour can be grouped into three broad perspectives of criminal con-duct. Furthermore, each of these perspectives suggests very different approaches to offender assessment (and treatment). Choosing the theory that produces the best assessment practices is a highly desired goal.

The three major perspectives of criminal behaviour are:

• Sociological
• Psychopathological
• General Personality and Social Psychological

Sociological perspectives

The sociological perspectives proposes that social, political and economic factors are responsible for crime. For example, poverty, lack of employment and educational opportunities, and systemic bias toward minority groups cause frustrations and motivations to engage in crime. These perspectives, in one form or another, say that society creates crime. That is, society is largely responsible for crime and the solution to crime rests in altering the social, political and economic situations of society's members.

Psychopathological perspectives

The psychopathological theories forward a view that is almost opposite to the sociological theories. Within the psychopathological perspective, people commit criminal acts because there is something psychologically or emotionally wrong with them. The cause of crime is located in the individual who has a “sickness” or a deficit of some sort and not in society. Individuals disobey the laws and norms of society because of a neurosis, or they are following the commands of internal voices. They may have too much testosterone that drives them to commit sexual crimes or they have a neurological disorder that results in uncontrolled, violent behaviour. For the psychopathological theories, it does not matter if one is poor or not, from an ethnic minority or a politically powerless group, these afflictions and diseases know no economic, social and political boundaries.

General personality and social psychological perspectives

The general personality and social psychological perspectives emphasize the learning of attitudes, emotions and behaviours that lead to criminal conduct. The focus is the individual (like the psychopathological theories) but it is the learning experiences of the person that account for crime. It is not so much that the offender is “sick”, but that the offender was exposed to situations that rewarded and encouraged antisocial behaviour. For example, a child who grows up in a home where the parent(s) allow aggressive and hostile behaviour, model antisocial attitudes and fail to direct the child in prosocial activities (e.g., school) and appropriate friendships, learns antisocial behaviour.

Each of the three perspectives directs our attention to different factors for understanding criminal behaviour. As a consequence, they suggest what should be assessed when dealing with offenders. Table 4.1 illustrates how the various perspectives forward certain variables as candidates for assessment. For example, the sociological perspectives stress the assessment of social position. (e.g., social class, economic wealth, etc.). The psychopathological models emphasize the assessment of psychological discomfort and pathology (e.g., feelings of anxiety, thought disorder). Finally, the general personality and social psychological perspectives point to a broad range of interpersonal (e.g., peer and family support for crime), personal (e.g., employment, substance abuse, procriminal attitudes) and social (e.g., neighbourhood opportunities for crime) factors.

TABLE 4.1 The relationship between theory and offender assessment
Theoretical Perspective	Example Characteristics Assessed
Sociological	Social status (e.g., age, gender)
	Race and ethnicity
	Financial status
Psychopathological	Psychological discomfort (e.g., anxiety)
	Self-esteem
	Bizarre thoughts
General Personality & Social Psychological	Peer support for behaviour
	Employment instability
	Antisocial attitudes
	Antisocial personality
	Substance abuse
	Antisocial behavioural history
	High crime neighbourhood

If we think about assessment from a theoretical perspective, we can make a few general observations. First, depending on the theoretical model, the range of variables seen as important varies. On one hand, the sociological perspective highlights relatively few variables for assessment. For the most part, assessments of social position are sufficient. Ask a few questions about one's financial situation and social and ethnic membership and the assessment is done. The other two perspectives consider many more variables. The general personality and social psychological model is particularly comprehensive as it considers social and situational factors in addition to psychological variables.

A second observation is that the sociological perspectives minimize the relevance of individual characteristics. This differential weighing of individual and broad social variables distinguish the sociological perspective from the other two theoretical viewpoints. The psychopathological and general personality and social psychology theories give considerable attention to the thoughts and feelings of individuals. In the sociological theories individual motivations, thoughts and emotions are barely mentioned.

Finally, the factors considered important in sociological perspectives of crime are mostly static factors. By focusing on static factors, the idea that people can change does not merit consideration and offender rehabilitation is assigned a minor role. You can not change one's race or ethnicity nor go from a state of poverty to wealth without the benefit of winning a major lottery. Because these socio-economic factors are largely unalterable, they can hardly serve as individual treatment goals.

At this point the reader may understandably feel a bit confused. What theory should be chosen to direct offender assessment activities? An evaluation of the evidence in support of a theoretical position is the key for selection among competing theories. A simple and straightforward way of evaluating a theoretical perspective is to see if the factors identified by theory are actually related to criminal behaviour. For example, are financial earnings, ethnicity, “nervousness”, and having criminal friends associated with an individual's criminal conduct?

THE EVIDENCE FOR THEORIES OF CRIMINAL BEHAVIOUR

Table 4.2 summarizes the findings from two reviews of the literature on the prediction of criminal behaviour. One is based upon general offenders (Gendreau, Little, & Goggin, 1996) and the other one focuses on mentally disordered offenders (Bonta, Law, & Hanson, 1998). Both reviews used the statistic r (Pearson correlation coefficient) as their measure of association between two variables. An r of zero indicates no association between a variable and recidivism. An r of 1.0 is a perfect association, something that only happens when the experimenter makes a computational error. Sometimes the r is negative meaning that the association is in the opposite direction. For example, the r of -0.19 for “mental disorder” indicates that having a mental disorder is associated with less recidivism. When r is less than 0.10, the association is considered quite weak. However, r values that exceed 0.10 can have practical significance.

As can be seen in Table 4.2, factors considered important by sociological and psychopathological theories of crime were among the weaker predictors. This was true regardless of the type of offender sample. In some cases (e.g., socio-economic status, personal distress) the correlations were extremely low.

The overall conclusion drawn from Table 4.2 is that the evidence is more favourable to the general personality and social learning perspective of criminal behaviour than the other two theoretical orientations. It is also noteworthy that three of the best predictors (criminal companions, antisocial personality and antisocial attitudes) are potentially changeable or dynamic. This is particularly important for treatment considerations as these variables can serve as goals in rehabilitation programs. The evidence presented in Table 4.2 is by no means the only evidence in support of a general personality and social learning perspective of criminal behaviour.²

TABLE 4.2 Predictors of criminal recidivism (r)
Theoretical Perspective/Predictor	General Offenders	Mentally Disordered
Sociological
Socio-economic status	0.06	0.00
Gender	0.10	0.11
Race	0.13	-0.01
Age	0.15	0.15
Psychopathological
Personal distress	0.05	-0.04
Intellectual functioning	0.07	0.01
Mental disorder	NR	-0.19
General Personality & Social Learning
Criminal history	0.18	0.23
Criminal companions	0.21	NR
Antisocial personality	0.18	0.18
Antisocial attitudes	0.18	NR
NR = Not reported.

TECHNICAL CHALLENGES OF OFFENDER ASSESSMENT

An empirically defensible theory may tell us what factors are important but theory does not tell us how best to assess these factors. How to assess offender characteristics is a technical measurement problem. In most situations where offender assessment plays a role, the underlying challenge is to correctly predict the criminal behaviour of the client. There are two general approaches to making decisions about the future criminal behaviour of offenders (i.e., recidivism). One approach, often referred to as the clinical method, uses subjective and professional judgements to assess the variables deemed important by theory. The other approach is more objective and leaves less room for subjective interpretation. This second approach is referred to as the actuarial method because it involves statistical evidence to base estimates of risk.

To illustrate the distinction in approaches, let us use the variable antisocial attitudes. Antisocial attitudes can be assessed in different ways. One can search for evidence of antisocial attitudes during a conversation with the offender (clinical method) or one can administer a paper-and-pencil test of antisocial attitudes (actuarial). In the first case, professional skills and experience are required to elicit and note expressions of antisocial attitudes. The interviewer may vary the questions asked from offender to offender. The problem with this is that the way information is gathered may potentially influence responses and therefore, the reliability of the assessment of antisocial attitudes. In the administration of a paper-and-pencil test, the assessment is con-ducted in a standard manner. Offenders are asked exactly the same questions and their responses are recorded in the same way for everyone.

In the real world, both approaches are frequently used together. However, the research suggests that one can place greater credibility in one approach over the other. Studies comparing clinical and actuarial methods in the prediction of criminal behaviour, or any behaviour for that manner, usually show that assessments based upon the objective approach tend to be more accurate (Grove & Meehl, 1996). What do we mean by “more accurate”? In any prediction task, there are four possible outcomes (see Table 4.3). You can predict that something will happen, and it does (cells A and D). For example, a Parole Board may predict that an offender is dangerous and the offender actually goes on to commit a violent crime (cell A). Or, the Board may predict that the offender is no risk to the public and it turns out that the offender makes a successful reintegration to society (cell D). You can make mistakes (cells B and C). For example, parole is denied to someone who, on follow-up, commits no new crimes (cell B) or parole is granted to an offender who reoffends violently (cell C).

A problem occurs when people assign different importance to the types of predictions and errors. To illustrate, one may be quite fearful in making a mistake that results in a new violent offence. A prediction strategy that would minimize this type of error would be to predict that all offenders would commit another crime. Of course, you will be right and capture every-one who may act in a dangerous manner (cell A) and there would be no one in cell C. But, at what cost? Studies suggest that there are large numbers of offenders who will not reoffend (cell B). For some, the numbers in cell B are a minor problem (“saving one victim is enough”). For others (e.g., civil libertarians, financial managers) it represents a serious social and economic issue. The offenders in cell B are denied freedom and unnecessarily incarcerated at great financial costs.

TABLE 4.3 The prediction task
	Actually Reoffends
Predicted to:	Yes	No
Reoffend	A	B
Not Reoffend	C	D

In general, it is best to think of predictive accuracy in terms of the overall proportions of correct predictions and errors. That is, we need to know how the numbers are distributed across all four cells to gain a true appreciation of our predictions. We must also accept the reality that no prediction instrument will be perfect. We can continue to work towards maximizing our correct predictions and minimizing our errors but we must be careful not to over-promise in our ability to predict. From our discussion of clinical and actuarial approaches to offender assessment, our starting point for improving predictive accuracy is to use actuarial methods in the measurement of offender characteristics and their situations.

Measuring theoretically relevant factors in an objective, actuarial manner, unfortunately, is not as easy as it sounds. Any measuring instrument will have some error associated with it. Even the trusty ruler that you had since grade school is not 100% accurate. When it comes to the assessment of human factors, the range of error is considerably greater than errors associated with mechanical instruments such as rulers, weigh scales, etc. This is one reason why we can never achieve perfect prediction.

One approach of limiting measurement error is to use different methods for assessing the same factor. Returning to the example of antisocial attitudes, we can measure this variable with a paper-and-pencil test and by way of a structured personal inter-view. Structured interviews are not open-ended clinical interviews. The structured interview involves an observable and clear method for asking questions and recording the answers. Furthermore, the results from structured interviews can be quantified and evaluated as to their validity.

By using more than one method of assessment, the problems associated with one method of assessment are counter-balanced by another method. For example, a potential problem with a paper-and-pencil measure is that one may not be certain that the offender understood the questions or if he/she was motivated to answer truthfully. In an interview approach, the interviewer can verify whether the questions are understood and gauge the offender's interest and motivation. Likewise, a problem with even structured interviews is that the interviewer still has some discretion to make slight alternations to the questions and therefore, affect the results. To counter this potential bias, paper-and-pencil measures permit no alterations in the questions. Research has shown that when more than one method is used to assess a certain offender characteristic, the overall predictive accuracy improves significantly. These research findings are easily translated into practice and the best correctional practices are seen when we use multiple methods (e.g., questionnaires, interviews, and direct behavioural observations).

The objective, multi-method measurement of theoretically relevant factors is the first step in improving predictive accuracy. The second step to improving predictive accuracy is to combine the individual factors to form more comprehensive offender assessment measures. The combining of factors are usually done in one of two ways. The simplest, called the Burgess method, is to assign a score of 1 if the factor is present and 0 if the factor is absent. Thus, you can have a number of items/factors in a scale that are simply scored (0 or 1) and then summated to give an overall score. The other method uses advanced statistical techniques to assign different weights to the factors. For example, gender may be seen as having more importance than anxiety level. Therefore, being male may be assigned a score of 4 and high anxiety levels a score of 1. An example of an offender assessment instrument using the Burgess method is the Level of Service Inventory -- Revised and an example using the weighting method is the Wisconsin Risk-Needs scale. The research evidence however, does not favour one approach of assigning scores over the other.

In the review by Gendreau et al. (1996), the r values frequently exceeded 0.30 when risk factors were combined into more general offender assessment instruments. The improvements are particularly robust when the factors come from different areas or domains. This is expected according to a general personality and social psychological theory. The theory hypothesises that there are many different factors that lead to criminal behaviour. A behavioural history of antisocial behaviour, criminal companions, antisocial attitudes, antisocial personality, family functioning, and substance abuse are some of the more important factors. Therefore, assessment instruments should measure these different domains rather than simply focus on one or two areas. Some offender assessment instruments are quite specific and focus on only one or two domains. The Statistical Information on Recidivism scale, for example, is very heavily weighted on criminal history factors. The Psychopathy Checklist -- Revised measures personality and criminal lifestyle features. These instruments produce relatively good predictive accuracy. However, their largely static qualities limit their usefulness in other important correctional practices such as treatment.

Finally, if we apply multi-method assessments to the different domains or factors related to criminal behaviour and then combine these domains, the prediction estimates increase substantially. A study by Andrews, Wormith, and Kiessling (1985) presents impressive evidence on how multi-method and multi-domain sampling can improve prediction. Adult probationers were given an assessment battery that measured different domains and used different methods of measurement. They found that the correlation (r) for antisocial attitudes and recidivism was 0.46 when a paper-and-pencil measure was used and 0.63 when it was combined with a structured interview. When this information was combined with other domains (e.g., antisocial personality, criminal history, age), the correlation (Canonical correlation to be precise) increased to a value of 0.74.

PURPOSEFUL USE OF RELEVANT FACTORS

Risk assessment

Having settled upon using an actuarial approach to assess theoretically relevant characteristics, and aware of the value of multi-method and multi-domain assessment techniques, we need to consider why we are conducting the assessment. In the introductory statements to this chapter, we saw that one purpose is the assessment of risk to reoffend. Although, risk assessment is obviously important for release and security decisions, it also has implications for treatment planning.

Table 4.4 gives three examples of what can happen when treatment programs are delivered to offenders who pose different levels of risk. Note that none of the examples show reductions in recidivism when treatment is delivered to low risk offenders. Actually, the trend is toward increased recidivism for low risk offenders who receive treatment. Reductions in recidivism are found when intensive levels of treatment are directed to higher risk offenders. The findings displayed in Table 4.4 mirror the results from nearly 300 tests of this “risk-by-treatment” effect (Andrews & Bonta, 1998). This general result is referred to as the Risk principle of effective treatment. That is, in order to reduce recidivism, intensive levels of treatment need to be directed to higher risk offenders.³

As Table 4.4 shows, assessments of offender risk are important for more than just release decisions and security classifications. Appropriate decisions concerning who to place into treatment are informed by offender risk. The Risk principle is especially informative for clinicians and treatment staff who have been schooled and trained in therapeutic techniques that are suited to clients who are verbally skilled, reflective and socially skilled. Although the “talking” and relationship oriented therapies can be helpful to many people, they are not very effective with the typical offender client. Many offenders lack the verbal and thinking skills required by these counselling techniques.

Consequently, when therapists practising relationship, verbal therapies meet failure with the offender client, they tend to blame the failure on the client's “resistance” and “lack of motivation” rather than the technique.

TABLE 4.4 Recidivism rates (%) as a function of treatment intensity and offender risk
	Treatment Intensity
Study	Risk Level	Low	High
Andrews & Kiessling (1980)	Low	12	17
	High	58	31
Bonta, Wallace-Capretta, & Rooney (1999)	Low	14	32
	High	51	31
Andrews & Friesen (1985)	Low	12	29
	High	92	25

Some observers have long admonished correctional and forensic therapists for preferring to counsel the low risk young, attractive, verbal, intelligent and socially skilled (YAVIS) client rather than the higher risk client who really needs the service. Not surprisingly, many therapists like to counsel the YAVIS client. This description of the preferred client also fits the description of the low risk offender. Low risk offenders are certainly more pleasant to counsel. Moreover, some of our ideas about criminals make it relatively easy to dismiss efforts for dealing with higher risk offenders (“he's a psychopath”, “he's too hard core to change”). The research evidence however, suggests that it is the higher risk client that can benefit from treatment more so than the lower risk offender. Fortunately, the importance of targeting higher risk offenders is permeating throughout the field as more treatment effort is being directed to higher risk offenders.

Needs assessment

One of the important derivations from a general personality and social psychological perspective of criminal conduct is that many of the factors identified as important are dynamic or change-able. An individual can change their attitudes and friends, he/she can find or lose a job, stop taking drugs or begin to drink heavily, and so on. Even antisocial personality features can be changed if we consider antisocial personality in a very broad sense rather than in the narrow sense of a diagnosis of psychopathy. This view of antisocial personality encourages attempts to change a constellation of dynamic offender attributes such as thrill seeking, impulsiveness and egocentrism.

For offender assessment, the theory highlights the importance of objectively and systematically assessing dynamic risk factors. Reviews of the literature show that dynamic risk factors predict recidivism as well as static risk factors (Gendreau et al., 1996). More importantly, changes in dynamic risk factors have been associated with changes in recidivism. Table 4.5 shows the results from a study by Andrews and Wormith (1984) where probationers were tested and retested on a measure of antisocial attitudes. Note for example, how offenders who scored low on a measure of antisocial attitudes at the beginning of supervision but scored more antisocial in their attitudes on the retest demonstrated increases in recidivism (from 10% to 20% to 67% when they scored in the high range). Likewise, when antisocial attitudes decreased, there was a trend toward reduced recidivism.

TABLE 4.5 Recidivism rates (%) as a function of changes in antisocial attitudes
	Risk at End
Risk at Start	Low	Medium	High
Low	10	20	67
Medium	10	37	57
High	7	43	40

Dynamic risk factors are also referred to as criminogenic needs. Criminogenic needs are those offender needs that when changed are associated with changes in recidivism. The Need principle of effective rehabilitation calls for the targeting of criminogenic needs in treatment programs. From an assessment perspective, the measurement of criminogenic needs is highly important for directing treatment services and for the active supervision of offenders.

The evidence is convincing that interventions that target criminogenic needs are associated with reductions in recidivism (Andrews & Bonta, 1998). The majority of offenders in Canada are under community supervision and almost all inmates are eventually released from custody. The public and correctional staff expects that when offenders are released from institutions and supervised in the community, their risk to public safety is being effectively managed. To reach the goal of reduced risk, correctional workers must address the criminogenic needs of offenders. To support the safe release of inmates, institutional staff must demonstrate reductions in measured criminogenic needs. At present, there are intervention programs that are reasonably effective and assessment instruments that reliably document changes in dynamic risk factors. Some of the assessment instruments are quite specific to a particular criminogenic need (e.g., measures of substance abuse or antisocial attitudes) and other instruments provide more general assessments of offender risk and needs (e.g., the Level of Service Inventory -- Revised; Andrews & Bonta 1995).

For offenders under community supervision, the monitoring of dynamic risk factors assumes an additional significance. Probation and parole officers need to be attentive to both improvement and deterioration in the offender's situation. Community supervisors easily note dramatic changes in the offender's situation. However, more subtle and gradual changes are not so easy to detect. Reliance on subjective, professional judgements of change is difficult to defend when objective, empirically based assessment measures are available. This is especially true when correctional staff can administer many of these measures after brief training. That is, psychologists and psychiatrists are not required to administer risk-need assessment instruments or many of the paper-and-pencil measures of criminogenic needs that are available.

To summarize thus far, there have been significant advances in the development of assessment measures for offender risk and criminogenic needs. One of the most important advances over the past twenty years is the recognition of the importance of dynamic risk factors for both treatment planning and offender supervision. Systematic assessments and re-assessments of offender dynamic risk factors should be a mandatory feature of any correctional system. It is the only reasonable way of monitoring the effectiveness of offender services and supervision.

A significant amount of assessment research is now directed to improving measures of criminogenic needs and extending the assessment of dynamic risk factors to special subgroups of offenders. For example, research on dynamic risk factors with sex offenders is one important area where studies are currently underway (Hanson & Harris, 1998). Other offender groups that require more specialized assessments include women offenders, male batterers and mentally disordered offenders. Although the assessment of offender risk and criminogenic needs garner the bulk of the research on offender assessment, an emerging area of research is the assessment of offender responsivity.

Assessment of responsivity factors

How people learn from life's experiences depends, in part, on certain cognitive, personality and social-personal factors. These factors may, or may not be, offender risk factors or criminogenic needs. They do however, influence the individual's responsiveness to efforts to help them to change their attitudes, thoughts and behaviours. These responsivity factors play an important role in choosing the type and style of treatment that would be most effective in bringing about a change. A few illustrations of responsivity factors are helpful in understanding this concept.

Our first example is taken from the cognitive domain. Individuals vary in their thinking styles (e.g., concrete vs. abstract, impulsive vs. reflective) and general intelligence. In terms of risk, neither of these two factors are particularly strong risk factors (remember Table 4.2). However, these cognitive factors are very important with respect to learning new thoughts and behaviours. They influence how an individual best profits from instruction and the ease of learning. Two offenders may be of equal risk to reoffend and have the same criminogenic needs but they can differ in their cognitive level and style. One may be more verbally skilled and quicker to grasp complex ideas while the other is less cognitively skilled. The goals of treatment are the same but how one reaches that goal will be influenced by the client's cognitive responsivity factors. For the more cognitively skilled client, a program that is highly verbal and that requires abstract reasoning skills may be effective. However, this same approach would present a serious challenge for the less cognitively sophisticated offender.

Another example is taken from the personality domain, the trait of anxiety. Once again, a responsivity factor without risk or criminogenic need qualities. Levels of anxiety are poor predictors of recidivism and decreases in anxiety are not associated with reductions in recidivism. Yet, the anxiety levels of offenders could impact on the choice of treatment. For example, an anger management program may work well in a group format consisting of relatively non-anxious individuals. For clients who are extremely anxious in social situations, the program would be more effective if delivered on an individual basis.

Some risk and criminogenic need factors may have responsivity characteristics. For example, offenders described as having an antisocial personality are not only higher risk offenders with many criminogenic needs, but their lack of empathy and anxiety require an intervention approach that is highly structured. Their energetic and restless nature calls for a treatment style that is active and stimulating. Classroom discussions and quiet readings are not the preferred mode of intervention for these types of offenders.

Objective measures of antisocial personality are available with one of the best validated instruments being Hare's Psychopathy Checklist. Unfortunately, because the Psychopathy Checklist is often used to form a diagnosis of psychopathy, the instrument is not conducive to treatment planning. A diagnosis of psychopathy is often seen as a sign of untreatability. As a result, efforts to treat “psychopathic” offenders is minimal despite the fact that there is no convincing evidence that theoretically relevant interventions will not “work”. In addition, there is no research exploring the role of psychopathy and/or antisocial personality as a responsivity factor.

Psychologists have been extremely successful in developing valid and reliable measures of other responsivity factors. There are many excellent measures of intelligence (e.g., the Wechsler IQ scale), anxiety (e.g., Spielberger's State-Trait Anxiety Inventory), and interpersonal maturity (e.g., Jesness I-Level). There is however, a need to develop good measures of impulsiveness, empathy and self-control, to name a few. Clearly, there is much work to be done.

In addition to cognitive and personality characteristics, some personal and demographic characteristics may operate as responsivity factors. Two possible candidates are gender and ethnicity. Women offenders may respond better to a style of intervention that is more women centred. Aboriginal offenders may benefit from a program offered by native counsellors and elders. Although there is no need for assessment measures of personal and demographic characteristics, there is a need for research examining the most effective styles of treatment based on gender and ethnicity factors.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

Research in offender assessment holds excitement and promise. Progress in the development of offender assessment instruments has been significant and there is little reason to think that this progress will slow in the near future. A listing of the achievements over the past two decades is impressive and worthy of review. They are:

1. A growing recognition of a theoretical model of criminal behaviour that has empirical support and practical implications.

• A general personality and social psychological perspective of criminal behaviour has received significant empirical support and it has identified some of the relevant factors for assessment. The theoretical model emphasizes the importance of both static and dynamic risk factors that form a bridge between offender assessment and treatment.

2. A shift from professional judgements to a reliance on objective, empirical approaches in offender assessment.

• Clinicians and other professionals are recognizing that their predictions of criminal recidivism can be enhanced with the use of objective assessment instruments. This is not to say that clinical and professional judgement need to be abandoned. There will always be cases where professional experience would be helpful. In addition, professional decision making can be made more observable and open to empirical validation. The development of structured clinical assessment instruments such as the HCR-20 is an example of how clinical assessments can be improved.

3. An acceptance of the fact that prediction of criminal behaviour will never be perfect.

• For a long time, many expected that social science methods would lead to an assessment technology that would yield almost perfect prediction. In actuality, prediction has fallen far short of perfection. Even the best instruments today produce high rates of error. However, improvements are being made and only the unabashed and ill-informed optimist expects that we will ever have an offender risk instrument that makes no mistakes. Accepting the complexity of human behaviour and the inherent errors associated with measurement is liberating. We are no longer chained to false hopes and unrealistic expectations.

4. The cataloguing of risk factors.

• Meta-analytic reviews of the recidivism prediction literature have produced a veritable menu of the risk factors associated with criminal behaviour. We have never had such a compilation of what should be assessed. More importantly, for the first time, we have a ranking of risk factors that direct us to focus on the assessment of the more critical offender characteristics.

5. The discovery of the importance of dynamic risk factor

• Limiting our offender assessments of risk to static factors has hindered our efforts to develop effective rehabilitation programs. Dynamic risk factors, or criminogenic needs, open the door for designing and evaluating treatment programs. Knowledge of dynamic risk factors is also valuable for the monitoring and supervision of offenders.

6. Combining static and dynamic risk factors into risk-needs instruments.

• Adding dynamic risk information to the static risk scales has yielded many advantages. We have moved beyond assessing risk for release and security classification that was the basic purpose of the static assessment instruments. With the dynamic information combined with the static to form risk-needs instruments we have maintained predictive accuracy and allowed for treatment planning and the assessment of offender change.

This list of achievements is truly impressive. Yet, there is much to do. We need to continue our search in identifying theoretically by relevant factors and develop measures to assess these factors. Although our prediction instruments will never reach perfection there is still tremendous room to improve predictive accuracy. Research on the assessment of responsivity factors and risk-needs factors specific to certain offender groups (e.g., sex offenders) must become a greater priority. Nevertheless, the momentum exists for continued improvements toward a more effective and humane correctional system.

---

¹ Solicitor General Canada

² For a more complete review of the evidence the interested reader is referred to Andrews and Bonta (1998).

³ Further discussion of the Risk Principle can be found in other chapters of this Compendium.

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REFERENCES

Andrews, D. A., & Bonta, J. (1998). The psychology of criminal conduct (2^nd ed.). Cincinnati, OH: Anderson.

Andrews, D. A., & Bonta, J. (1995). The Level of Service Inventory -- Revised. Toronto, ON: Multi-Health Systems.

Andrews, D. A., & Wormith, J. S. (1984). Criminal sentiments and criminal behaviour. (Programs Branch User Report). Ottawa, ON: Solicitor General Canada.

Andrews, D. A., Wormith, J. S., & Kiessling, J. J. (1985). Self-reported criminal propensity and criminal behaviour: Threats to the validity of assessment and personality. (Programs Branch User Report). Ottawa, ON: Solicitor General Canada.

Bonta, J., Law, M., & Hanson, K. (1998). The prediction of criminal and violent recidivism among mentally disordered offenders: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 123, 123-142.

Gendreau, P., Little, T., & Goggin, C. (1996). A meta-analysis of the predictors of adult offender recidivism: What works! Criminology, 34, 575-607.

Grove, W. M., & Meehl, P. E. (1996). Comparative efficiency of informal (subjective, impressionistic) and formal (mechanical, algorithmic) prediction procedures: The clinical-statistical controversy. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 2, 293-323.

Hanson, R. K., & Harris, A. (1998). Dynamic predictors of sexual recidivism. (User Report No. 1998-01). Ottawa, ON: Solicitor General Canada.

 

CHAPTER 5

Treatment Responsivity: Reducing Recidivism by Enhancing Treatment Effectiveness

SHARON M. KENNEDY¹

One of the contemporary concerns in corrections is the risk management of offenders in the community. Thus, in many correctional agencies, treatment is currently viewed as an integral part of the risk management continuum, and therefore, treatment responsivity is a critical issue for correctional programs. The responsivity principle has been a largely neglected area of study, despite the fact that responsivity and other variables related to offender motivation are widely recognized as critical factors mediating the success of treatment (Brown, 1996). It is postulated that treatment readiness and responsivity must be assessed and considered in treatment planning if the maximum effectiveness of supervision and treatment programs is to be realized and if we want to ensure the successful reintegration of the offender into the community.

This chapter addresses the concept of treatment responsivity and examines a number of responsivity assessment measures currently in use. The development of a new standardized assessment battery of offender responsivity is presented, and a number of responsivity-related factors are identified and discussed in terms of their potential impact on treatment outcome. The construct of treatment responsivity is placed in a context that underscores the importance of allocating offenders to programs in the most effective manner and of identifying factors that might mediate the effectiveness of treatment services.

FOUR GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF CLASSIFICATION

The research of Andrews and colleagues outlines the four general principles of classification for purposes of effective correctional programming (Andrews, Kiessling, Robinson, & Mickus, 1986; Andrews, Zinger, Hoge, Bonta, Gendreau, & Cullen, 1990). These principles are based on their detailed analysis of programs that showed above-average success in reducing recidivism.

The risk principle states that the intensity of the treatment intervention should be matched to the risk level of the offender. This is because research has demonstrated that higher risk cases tend to respond better to intensive and extensive service, while low risk cases respond better to minimal or no intervention. Rehabilitation programs should, therefore, be reserved for higher risk offenders in order to achieve the greatest reductions in recidivism. The reality is that low risk offenders usually do well without intensive treatment. Also, there may be a harmful effect by putting low risk offenders in programs along with high-risk offenders, as one would run the risk of disrupting the low risk offender's positive social networks.

Once offenders are appropriately matched in terms of their risk level, attention should be directed to the sorts of needs to be addressed in treatment. The need principle distinguishes between criminogenic and non-criminogenic needs. The former are dynamic risk factors (Gendreau, Cullen, & Bonta, 1994), (a subset of an offender's risk level), which, if changed, reduce the likelihood of criminal conduct. In contrast, such non-criminogenic needs as anxiety and self-esteem (Gendreau et al., 1994) may be appropriate targets when working on responsivity issues; however, such needs would be inappropriate targets for risk reduction, as their resolution would not have a significant impact on recidivism.

The responsivity principle states that styles and modes of treatment service must be closely matched to the preferred learning style and abilities of the offender (Andrews et al., 1986). Treatment effectiveness depends on matching types of treatment and therapists to types of clients. Effective matching of offenders' and counsellors' “styles”, as well as intensity of intervention, is central to the principle of treatment responsivity (Bonta, 1995).

The professional discretion principle states that, having reviewed risk, need and responsivity considerations as they apply to a particular offender, there is a need for professional judgement. The most appropriate treatment decisions include professional judgement, which in turn incorporates legal, ethical, humanitarian, cost-efficiency and clinical standards. In some cases, then, the application of professional judgement will (and should) override recommendations based on numerical scores alone, thereby improving the final offender assessment on programming strategies.

DEFINITION, MODEL OF TREATMENT RESPONSIVITY AND RELATED CONSTRUCTS

The responsivity principle

Three components of responsivity include matching the following treatment approach with the learning style of the offender, the characteristics of the offender with those of the counsellor, and the skills of the counsellor with the type of program conducted. Offenders differ significantly, not only in their level of motivation to participate in treatment, but also in terms of their responsivity to various styles or modes of intervention. According to the responsivity principle, these factors impact directly on the effectiveness of correctional treatment and, ultimately, on recidivism.

If the responsivity principle is not adhered to, treatment pro-grams can fail, not because they do not have therapeutic integrity or competent therapists, but rather because offender responsivity related barriers, such as cognitive/intellectual deficits, were not addressed. This last factor, for example, could prevent the offender from understanding the content of the program. Consequently, various offender characteristics must be considered when assigning offenders to treatment programs.

Internal responsivity factors

We can consider responsivity factors as individual factors that interfere with or facilitate learning. The assessment of such factors is the first step in helping us develop the best strategies as to how to best address an offender's criminogenic needs. This, in turn, can ensure that offenders derive the maximum therapeutic benefit from treatment. Therefore, prior to targeting criminogenic needs, it is important that responsivity factors be examined to prepare the offender for treatment.

The responsivity principle dictates that treatment programs should be delivered in a manner that facilitates the learning of new prosocial skills by the offender. Factors that interfere with or facilitate learning can be broken down into internal and external responsivity factors.

Internal factors refer to individual offender characteristics such as: motivation, personality characteristics (i.e., psychopathy, inter-personal anxiety, depression, mental illness, self-esteem, poor social skills) cognitive/intellectual deficits (i.e., low intelligence, concrete-oriented thinking, inadequate problem solving skills, poor verbal skills, low verbal intelligence, language deficits) and demographic variables (i.e., age, gender, race, ethnicity and socio-economic level) (Bonta, 1995; Van Hooris, 1997).

External factors refer to counsellor characteristics (i.e., some counsellors may work better with certain types of offenders) and setting characteristics (i.e., institution versus community, individual versus group).

Specific internal responsivity factors are represented in most settings. Consideration of gender issues, ethnicity, age, social background, and life experiences may prove to be important for some types of treatment because they contribute to the engagement of offenders into treatment and the development of therapeutic alliance (Dana, 1993). For instance, recent research indicates that women offenders score significantly lower than male offenders on measures of self-esteem and self-efficacy (McMurran, Tyler, Hogue, Cooper, Dunseath, & Mc Daid, 1998). Low self-esteem may be a responsivity factor that needs to be addressed in some women offenders; however, the link between self-esteem and criminal behaviour is weak. Other ways that gender as a responsivity factor can be seen is the concern women express for childcare, men dominating co-ed treatment groups, and women with a history of abuse being subjected to confrontational groups led by male counsellors.

An offender's level of intellectual functioning is an important responsivity consideration. According to Fabiano, Porporino, and Robinson (1991), cognitive skills programs are more effective with offenders of average to high-average intelligence and are less effective with offenders of below-average intelligence.

Similarly, age may be viewed as a responsivity factor. Those who have worked with young offenders, for example, can easily understand the challenge they pose in the delivery of treatment programs (Cady, Winters, Jordan, Solberg, & Stinchfield, 1996). Certainly, the “average” young offender would present different challenges to the effective delivery of a treatment than would be the case for an “average” adult offender. Age, in and of itself however, does not provide the necessary degree of precision required when the assessment of responsivity is the issue. It is important, for instance, to have adequate information on the individual's level of maturity, as this will effect how the individual views the need for change, how he or she relates to others, etc. Age alone does not provide enough information, as maturity level can vary widely within the same general age group (i.e., you may find as much variation in maturity levels within a young offender group as you would between a young offender group and an adult offender group) (Cady et al., 1996).

Using gender and maturity level to provide the context, then, it is easy to imagine how ignoring responsivity factors can result in the inaccurate assessment of an individual's treatment motivation or readiness, and how this may seriously impede an offender's compliance with treatment.

Motivation as a dynamic variable

Motivation may be operationally defined as “the probability that a person will enter into, continue, and adhere to a specific strategy” (Miller & Rollnick, 1991). The traditional view of motivation was very narrow and simplistic. Motivation was defined as a personality characteristic or problem. Thus, motivation was used as an adjective, and the desire to change was perceived as a quality one had or did not have. This view failed to include all the dynamic factors that influence a person's desire to change his or her behaviour, and has been replaced in recent years with a view that emphasizes the complexity of change. The interactionalist view asserts that internal and external factors influence the change process. From this perspective, motivation is seen as an interpersonal process that can be influenced in a positive way by the professional (Miller & Rollnick, 1991).

In this context, motivation is dynamic and, therefore, at least some responsibility falls to the therapist to motivate the offender (Miler & Rollnick, 1991). The counsellor must strive to create effective motivational choices in order to increase the probability that offenders will respond favourably to correctional programming. This includes enhancing offender motivation and dealing with resistant clients after the pre-treatment assessment of treatment readiness.

Most offenders entering treatment are unmotivated and resist-ant to treatment, and, moreover, most offenders have multiple treatment needs. To further compound the situation, offenders often do not acknowledge that they have problems. Generally they enter treatment because of pressure from external sources, such as family, or to secure an earlier release. Offenders who are resistant to treatment may well require pre-treatment priming (motivational counselling) in order for the formal treatment pro-gram to be effective.

Many offenders view their criminal behaviour in an egosyntonic manner. That is, they are relatively unconcerned about their actions, except in terms of legal consequences. Accordingly, offenders often feel coerced into treatment, consenting only because the contingencies for refusing to participate are sufficiently negative. Minimization of the effects of their behaviour on others, denial of responsibility, and rationalization of their law violations are common among offenders. Treatment engagement must address these obstacles, primarily by focusing on therapeutic alliance and assisting offenders to develop a cost-benefit analysis for comparison purposes (Preston & Murphy, 1997). Further, the content, intensity, and style of intervention must be consistent with the offender's current stage in the change process. This complex inter-action forms the cornerstone for incorporating motivational inter-viewing into correctional programming (Miller & Rollnick, 1991). Treatment progress may therefore depend on the match between the offender and type of treatment modality, as well as, the interaction between counsellor and offender. Currently, however, there is little empirical data to indicate the relative contribution of these factors to treatment progress (Serin & Kennedy, 1998). Clearly, there is a need for more research in this area.

External responsivity factors

Correctional Counsellor/Worker Characteristics

Regardless of the therapeutic orientation or the characteristics of the client group, a client is more apt to engage in treatment and treatment is more likely to be effective if a good therapeutic alliance is created (Cartwright, 1980, 1987). For example, many researchers in the general psychotherapy field are of the opinion that the single most powerful predictor of the outcome of psychotherapy is the quality of the therapeutic alliance (Luborsky, Crits-Cristoph, Mintz, & Auerbach, 1988; Najavitis & Weis, 1994).

Unfortunately, there has been considerably less research examining the importance of the relationship between counsellors and offenders. With the exception of the CaVIC (Canadian Volunteers in Corrections) research conducted by Andrews and Kiessling (1980) on characteristics of effective probation officers, and the differential treatment research of Barkwell (1980) there is little systematic research on the quality of the therapeutic alliance and the interaction effects of counsellor and offender characteristics in the field of correctional treatment. This is a much needed area of research, as it has often been found that a group of counsellors working in a common setting and offering the same treatment approach can produce dramatic differences in terms of client attrition and successful outcome. Counsellor attitudes and competence that do not match the aims and content of a program may lower treatment integrity and reduce its effectiveness. The Maudsley Alcohol Pilot Project (MAPP), for example, found that community based generic workers often lacked therapeutic commitment towards their clients which limited their ability to deliver effective treatment (Cartwright, Hyams, & Spratley, 1996).

Appropriate role modelling is also a critical aspect of the counsellor offender relationship. An important role for correctional workers is to function as competent role models. According to Andrews and Bonta (1994), effective workers are able to establish high quality relationships with the client, approve of the client's anti-criminal expressions (reinforcement), and disapprove of the client's pro-criminal expressions (punishment), while, at the same time, demonstrating anti-criminal alternatives (modelling).

Setting Characteristics/Modes of Program Delivery

Some research has suggested that appropriate treatment pro-grams delivered in the community produce two to three times greater reductions in recidivism than appropriate treatment pro-grams delivered in prison (Andrews et al., 1990). There are different issues and constraints for each setting. For example, with institutional and treatment programs in community correctional centres, offenders typically show up for treatment as a much more captive audience. In the community or outpatient settings, the no shows rate is higher, presumably because the client has more freedom to choose. It is important to understand that external factors, in isolation, may not impact on responsivity, but rather those staff characteristics or setting characteristics interact with offender characteristics to affect responsivity, either positively or negatively.

RESPONSIVITY ASSESSMENT MEASURES

Current measures

Although responsivity is clearly identified as the third principle of effective correctional treatment, there is a paucity of standardized assessment measures in existence. The need for a systematic and comprehensive assessment of responsivity and its related constructs (i.e., motivation and treatment readiness) is essential for the successful planning, implementation and delivery of appropriate and effective treatment programs. This is especially true when reintegrating offenders into the community. Many offenders, for example, have a special condition to participate in treatment while under community supervision. For these offenders, the risk assessment clearly indicates the need for treatment to reduce their risk of reoffending. In order to make sound release decisions and enhance the protection of the public by effectively managing the risk that offenders pose; we would want to be able to assess their treatability (level of motivation and responsivity to treatment) prior to releasing them into the community. Simply relying on their self-reported motivation to change is obviously not sufficient, as the veracity of these admissions is questionable. Furthermore, offenders who say they are motivated to change are not necessarily those who present the highest risk of reoffending. In addition, motivation is a dynamic factor and, as such, can change over time and therefore needs to be reassessed over time. Needless to say, this factor is important in the assessment and ongoing measurement of progress in therapy, which, in turn, is critical to effective risk management of offenders in the community (McMurran et al., 1998).

The Client Management Classification (CMC) is a widely used responsivity tool in corrections. This instrument was developed as part of the Wisconsin Risk and Needs Assessment system, and became part of the National Institute of Corrections Model Probation and Parole Project (National Institute of Corrections, 1981). CMC differentiates five offender profiles and prescribes detailed supervision guidelines for each profile. It also facilitates case planning. According to Harris (1994), the goal of the CMC is to “tailor supervision strategies and styles to the characteristics of the offender” (page 155).

By identifying offender characteristics and recommending supervision strategies, the CMC represents an attempt to match offenders and staff based on responsivity characteristics. For example, one type of offender category of the CMC is the Limit Setter (LS). The LS offender is characterized as comfortable with a criminal life-style and long involvement with criminal activities. This individual is often reasonably capable of functioning adequately in society, however, he/she may often minimize or deny personal problems, appear to be unmotivated to use his/her abilities in a pro-social manner, and he/she is manipulative. For this type of offender the CMC recommends that the client-agent relationship be a direct one, with a willingness to confront their failure to comply with the rules. It is also suggested that the agent be on guard to avoid manipulation, and should anticipate hostility from these clients, who resent interference with their lives.

On the other end, the CMC identifies the Environmental Structure (ES) client. Characteristics of this type of offender include a lack of social and vocational skills, and a low level of intellectual functioning. A lack of foresight about consequences of criminal activity and high degrees of impulsivity are common traits. The client-agent relationship with these types of cases would be more giving and caring. A guidance and supportive role would be recommended.

The CMC demonstrates the potential of assessing responsivity characteristics.

The Jesness Personality Inventory (Jesness, 1983) is another instrument that can help assess offenders' “personality” traits. This instrument is the second most widely used personality inventory in juvenile court clinics in the United States (Pinkerman, Haynes & Keiser, 1993). The Jesness was designed specifically for use with juvenile delinquent populations both male and female, ages 8-18 (Pinsoneault, 1998). Similar to the Client Management Classification, the Jesness Personality Inventory helps identify offender personality characteristics that can be an obstacle to treatment. Other responsivity factors that should be assessed include intelligence, motivational level, learning disabilities, reading ability, denial/minimization, inter-personal anxiety, cultural issues, and communication barriers.

The Level of Service Inventory-Ontario Revision (LSI-OR) (Andrews, Bonta, & Wormith, 1995) is the first risk assessment instrument to incorporate a section on “special responsivity considerations”. It should be noted that, although the responsivity items are not tallied as part of the risk score or level, they are factors to be considered in the broader case management of the offender, and may indirectly impact on an offender's dynamic risk level. The special responsivity considerations measured by the instrument are: motivation as a barrier, denial/minimization, interpersonal anxiety, cultural issues, low intelligence and communication barriers.

A Model for assessment of treatment responsivity

Prochaska and his colleagues have conducted important research on the process of psychotherapy change (Prochaska & DiClemente, 1986; Prochaska, DiClemente, & Norcross, 1992), in the areas of substance abuse, criminality, and a variety of high-risk health behaviors (Prochaska & DiClemente, 1992). These researchers believed that individuals vary in terms of their stage of readiness for change and, as such, different therapeutic approaches/techniques need to be applied, depending on the individual's readiness to take action. To ensure their intervention is sensitive to the clients' level of readiness, Prochaska developed and validated a self-report measure, the University of Rhode Island Change Assessment (URICA), on various samples. According to this model, individuals in the process of change move through a series of stages prior to changing their problematic behaviour. The five stages of change that have been identified are: precontemplation, contemplation, preparation/ determination, action, and maintenance.

In the precontemplation stage, the individual is not considering the possibility of change and does not think he/she has a problem. Individuals in this stage typically perceive that they are being coerced into treatment to satisfy someone else's need. The verbalization typically is “I don't have any problems that need to be addressed. I am only here because my parole officer/partner/ National Parole Board said I had to see a counsellor”. Prochaska refers to this stage as “perceived coercion”. Anyone working in the criminal justice system knows that, in fact, it is not perceived coercion, it is real. If the offender does not participate in treatment then there is little probability that recidivism can be reduced or that the risk level of the offender can be managed effectively.

The contemplation stage is characterized by ambivalence; in other words, individuals may simultaneously, or in rapid alter-nation, consider and reject reasons to change. At this stage individuals are aware that a problem exists, but are not ready to commit to therapy. The verbalization typically is “I am interested in learning more about this treatment group, but I cannot participate yet because I am just too busy”.

The preparation/determination stage is characterized by a combination of intention and behavioural criteria. Individuals at this stage may report that they have made some small behavioural changes. Miller and Rollnick (1991) refer to this stage as the window of opportunity, which opens only for a limited period of time, however, clinical experience working with offenders in this stage would suggest that it is not a window, but is at best, a porthole of opportunity.

Individuals in the action stage have made a commitment to change and are engaging in actions to bring about change; in other words, they are actively doing things to change or modify their behaviour, experiences, or environment in order to over-come their problems. At this stage they are typically involved in therapy or counselling.

Lastly, individuals in the maintenance stage are working hard to sustain the significant behavioural changes they have made and are actively working to prevent minor slips or major relapses. This stage is not static, but rather dynamic particularly when the individual is exposed to high-risk situations. The problem is not that offenders do not change, but rather that they do not maintain the changes. The criteria for assessing someone to be in the maintenance stage are being able to engage in new incompatible behaviour for a period of six months.

This transtheoretical treatment model (Prochaska & DiClemente; Norcross, 1992) highlights the importance of treatment readiness and is consistent with the responsivity concept.

Although the assessment work of Prochaska and his colleagues is evolving, it provides a starting point for our work on the development of a multi-method assessment strategy of treatment readiness and responsivity with offenders (Serin & Kennedy, 1998). Its application to correctional intervention with a wide population of offenders, representing a range of offence types and settings, may well provide the conceptual focus that has been lacking.

Recent developments

A theoretically-based, multi-method assessment protocol for treatment readiness, responsivity and gain was developed in conjunction with the Research Branch of the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) in order to contribute to the broader literature on effective correctional programming. The intent was to pilot an assessment battery that could be administered in conjunction with a range of correctional programs. Accordingly, the protocol was developed for generic application rather than for a particular type of treatment program (Kennedy & Serin, 1997). This was the first step towards a systematic protocol for the assessment of treatment responsivity in the context of a risk/need management framework, in which treatment is an integral part of the risk management continuum.

The second step is now completed and an interview-based assessment protocol for treatment readiness, responsivity and gain was developed (Serin & Kennedy, 1998). A set of guide-lines for counsellors' ratings and a more explicit scoring scheme was establish to maximize reliability. Plans are also underway to develop a training package, to implement the revised protocol with a wide range of correctional programs and to begin to collect data on the assessment protocol.

Pre-treatment responsivity assessment

To augment offender assessment, as well as select and allocate treatment regimes, it would be useful to assess treatment readiness, motivation and treatability in an objective fashion. The veracity of an offender's self-reported motivation to change may be questionable, particularly when he/she is attempting to secure an earlier release and, consequently, such information should never be used in isolation. Some examples of items that should be considered in a responsivity assessment instrument would include whether or not the offender: recognizes he/she has a problem, is able to set treatment goals, is motivated for treatment, accepts responsibility for his/her problems, understands the costs/benefits of treatment, has previously engaged in treatment, (with data on the progress made therein), has access to the support of significant others, support for their involvement in treatment, and is able to express his/her feelings and emotions. Additionally, one may wish to consider the offender's, personal views about treatment providers, his/her sense of self-efficacy in making changes and leading a prosocial life, and if he/she is cognizant of the emotional demands of treatment (Kennedy, 1999).

Personality and attitudinal characteristics

Offenders' personality and attitudinal characteristics are important responsivity factors, as they will impact on the design of a treatment program. Temperamental and personality factors conducive to criminal activity such as grandiosity, callousness, impulsivity, anger problems, egocentrism and poor problem solving skills are all potential responsivity factors to consider, since they can effect an offenders willingness or ability to engage in treatment programs. Attitudinal characteristics that should be assessed include antisocial attitudes, values and beliefs, techniques of neutralization, attitudes towards victims and procriminal associates and isolation from anti-criminal others (Kennedy, 1999).

Treatment participation

As indicated earlier, simply relying on offenders' self-report of how much he/she benefited from participation in treatment is insufficient. In a similar vein, program completion, in and of itself, does not pro-vide us with any additional information in terms of how to effectively manage the risk level of the offender. Despite the obvious importance of measuring progress in treatment this has been an often-neglected aspect of assessment. It is important for staff to measure knowledge of program content, skills acquisition, individual and group disclosure, offender confidence, transfer and generalization of skills to real life situations, insight, attendance, participation, performance and therapeutic alliance (Kennedy, 1999).

Of course, the true effects of responsivity and other (motivational) factors on treatment can only be determined by examining recidivism rates over extended periods of time. If offenders who both acknowledge responsibility for their crimes and attend and actively participate in therapy, have lowered recidivism rates compared to those who do not, then the motivational (responsivity) variables have demonstrated meaning beyond treatment gains measured during, or immediately upon completion of treatment.

CONCLUSION

The principle of responsivity, which includes the appropriate matching of offenders to programs and staff, and the identification of factors that might mediate the effectivness of treatment services, has not been given the attention it deserves. Offenders are not all alike, nor are all staff, settings, or treatment programs. The matching of offenders to treatment, counsellors to offenders, and counsellors to the treatment groups that best match their skills, can improve the effectiveness of correctional intervention. Responsivity should therefore be an important consideration in risk management and risk reduction. Failure to appropriately assess and consider responsivity factors may not only undermine treatment gains and waste treatment resources, but also may also decrease public safety.

Best practices with regard to responsivity starts with good assessment. Knowing an offender's motivation level, cognitive ability, personality traits, and maturity is essential to good case planning. Following assessment, a good case plan takes into account factors related to the treatment settings, the treatment program options and staff characteristics. For example, having a range of treatment settings available (i.e., residential, outpatient, secure, open, etc.) gives the counsellor more options with regard to placing the offender in the most appropriate treatment setting. Finally, understanding the skills and interests of staff should also become part of the case planning process, and will allow for more effective matching of offenders and counsellors.

Bonta (1996) suggests that fourth generation risk assessments will, in all likelihood, include the assessment of possible responsivity factors. If we can successfully assess responsivity then we can design even more effective treatment services for offenders in the future. Research has demonstrated that the average reduction in recidivism for appropriate treatment is 25% (Gendreau & Goggin, 1996). Under conditions where responsivity factors are accurately assessed and adequately addressed, we can look forward to a greater number of offenders successfully completing treatment. Consequently, a higher degree of public safety will be achieved through even greater reductions in recidivism.

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¹ Ottawa District Psychologist, Correctional Service of Canada. The author would like to thank Dr. Alex Loucks, and Michel Larivière, Correctional Service of Canada, and Dr. Ed Latessa, University of Cincinnati, for helpful comments on an earlier draft of this chapter.

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CHAPTER 6

Obstacles to Effective Correctional Program Delivery

PAUL GENDREAU, CLAIRE GOGGIN, and PAULA SMITH¹

While considerable evidence now exists regarding “what works” with respect to offender assessment and treatment practices, recent surveys indicate that very few programs adhere to best practices. This chapter outlines several obstacles to employing best practices, including theoreticism and the failure to effect technology transfer.

Enormous gains in knowledge in the field of corrections have occurred (see Andrews & Bonta, 1998; Cullen & Gendreau, 2000) since Martinson ironically proclaimed in the mid 1970s that “nothing works” (Martinson, 1976).

Well informed corrections professionals can now claim, with a reasonable degree of confidence, that the strongest predictors of criminal behaviour and the most useful risk measures have been determined. Moreover, it is now apparent which types of “treatment” programs produce the greatest reductions in recidivism. While this is a desirable state of affairs and a most useful springboard from which to generate pro-active policies for corrections managers, the sad reality is that much of representative correctional practice bears little resemblance to what we know “works” (Gendreau & Goggin, 2000; Gendreau, Paparozzi, Little, & Goddard, 1993). A recent meta-analysis (Andrews, Dowden, & Gendreau, 1999) reported just 13% of 374 published evaluations of offender treatment programs were based on the principles of effect treatment (i.e., behavioural treatments targeting the criminogenic needs of higher risk offenders). This 13% represents a drop from 20% among studies conducted only a decade or so earlier. Taking the published literature as today's norm, one reads about unstructured programs that target the dubious needs (e.g., personal inadequacy) of lower risk offenders or programs based on simple-minded conceptions of “get-tough” strategies (e.g., electronic monitoring, boot camps). To make matters worse, many programs are delivered in custodial settings where it is difficult to effect behavioural change.

If this is the status of studies in the published literature, what are the conditions “in the real world”? Some assume the worst, that is, effective correctional interventions are virtually non-existent in field settings (Lab & Whitehead, 1990). Gendreau and Goggin (2000) attempted to assess Lab and Whitehead's claim through an evaluation of the quality of correctional treatment programs “in the field” using the Correctional Program Assessment Inventory (CPAI) (Gendreau & Andrews, 1996; soon to be revised as the CPAI -- 2000). Unfortunately, a strong majority of programs did not receive a “passing grade”. Some of the major weaknesses were inadequate assessments, unspecified treatments, a lack of suit-able staff qualifications and training, and programmers' lack of awareness of the “what works” literature (Gendreau & Goggin, 2000).

The reasons for the above-noted scenarios are patently obvious. Many correctional policy makers and managers, particularly in the United States, took Martinson's (1976) proclamation to heart, embracing the new epoch of sanctions as the next “holy grail”. Certainly, the socio-political context of that time was favourably disposed to adopting Martinson's pro-posed view (Cullen & Gendreau, 1989). Others have argued that the correctional system is simply a profit-making enterprise (Shichor, 1995) wherein the incentive to reduce crime through treatment is non-existent. More substantial profits are more easily generated through the construction and operation of additional prisons. Then, there is the assumption by some pundits, policy makers, and politicians that the court of public opinion favours a punitive policy -- an impression which, by the way, is not supported by the data (Cullen, Fisher, & Apple gate, 2000) -- thus providing more support for the use of “get tough” strategies.

How can this paradox be resolved? That is, will there ever be congruence between the “what works” evaluation literature and actual correctional practice? Let us not be naïve; the expectation that social policy in North America in general, and corrections in particular, is primarily driven by the results from objective, valid, replicated experiments (i.e., the “experimenting society”, Campbell, 1969) has been shown to be frightfully gullible (Gendreau & Ross, 1987). But is it too much to expect that, despite the power of common-sense political ideologies, the media, and the North American predilection to rule by market forces, we can aspire to at least a modest correlation between solid experimental evidence and correctional policy? We think not. If we could ensure a hit rate of even 20%–40% between evidence and policy, it would mean that correctional policy would be more rational and cost-effective. It would also pre-empt the cyclical pattern of quick fix solutions or “panaceaphilia” to which we have so readily self-prescribed (Gendreau, 1999; Gendreau & Ross, 1979). Thus, in order to approximate the ideals of the experimenting society we need to address the following issues.

WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE

Included among the major obstacles are the theoreticism that exists at the scholarly and policy-making levels, the difficulties in effecting technology transfer from the “experts” to managers and practitioners, and the lack of suitable training programs (Gendreau, 1996).

Theoreticism

The practice of theoreticism involves the acceptance or rejection of knowledge relative to one's personal values and experiences (i.e., intuitionism) (Andrews & Bonta, 1998; Gendreau, 1995). Methods of inquiry that are rooted in positivism and inductive reasoning are disparaged. Theoreticism is further complicated by a confusing array of sometimes bewildering value systems among the several disciplines (e.g., criminology, economics, law, management, psychiatry, psychology, social work, and sociology) and occupations (academics, administrators, clinicians, and police) who compete for intellectual hegemony in the criminal justice field (Gendreau & Ross, 1979). Theoreticism is characterized by a profound anti-intellectualism that takes the form of a lack of interest in and/or respect for other sources of knowledge and may be construed as operating in three ways. These include paradigm passion and ethnocentrism, knowledge destructions, and the “MBA” management syndrome (Gendreau, 1999; Latessa & Holsinger, 1998).

Paradigm passion and ethnocentrism

Paradigm passion refers to the realities of the world of work, which often can be quite limited. First, our training, by necessity, is narrowly focussed. Most of us associate intimately with very few colleagues, mainly those from the same social and training background. The mandates of our work settings often impose filters on our professional outlook. For example, we work in a setting in which all of our colleagues have a strong behaviourist orientation; we are exposed only rarely to contrasting viewpoints on human nature. Embracing ideas and activities that are orthogonal to what is considered au courant by the field receives little reinforcement.

Ethnocentrism evolves out of paradigm passion. That is, once we fall into the trap of believing that our disciplinary boundaries and the socio-political context we live in adequately define how things should be, then it is a very small step to tacitly assuming that our reality is indeed superior to others.

For example, we have witnessed expressions of bewilderment on the faces of psychologists after suggesting that one should keep abreast of criminological journals. They were seemingly oblivious to the fact that some criminological and sociological theories (e.g., differential association) have something useful to say about the prediction and treatment of offenders. As a result of reviewing some of the evidence contributed to the American Psychological Association's Commission on Violence and Youth, the first author was struck by the fact that psychologists dealing with juvenile offenders seemed blind to the supporting literature emanating from the adult domain. Similarly, drug abuse treatment evaluators have, with few exceptions, ignored the corrections literature (Gendreau, 1995). All of this is unfortunate, given that the predictors of antisocial behaviour and the principles of effective treatment for juvenile and adult offenders correspond highly, and it is difficult to distinguish between the clientele served by the criminal justice and substance abuse systems.

These examples may also be seen as evidence of a subtle form of ethnocentrism. More blatant examples of ethnocentrism are the fact that some American reviews on treatment effectiveness almost never reference the literature from foreign countries where different approaches to the “crime problem” have been implemented (e.g., less incarceration). Regrettably, there have been occasions where foreign contributions are derogatorily referenced (or worse, not referenced at all) in order, we are surmising, to validate current policies (i.e., punishment rather than rehabilitation) (see Gendreau, Smith, & Goggin, 2001).

Paradigm passion and ethnocentricism can lead to anti-intellectual consequences of staggering proportions. For example, one of the singular features of ineffective treatment strategies is punishing-smarter programs (Gendreau et al., 1993). One would think that program designers and evaluators in this area would have attended to the vast experimental and human behaviour modification literature on punishment and the social psychological research on persuasion and coercion, which provide a convincing rationale as to why punishing-smarter programs should not work. There are, collectively, about 30,000 references covering these two areas. In the entire punishing-smarter literature, just two of these have ever been cited (Gendreau, 1996).

Knowledge destruction

Knowledge destruction is a deliberate and conscious attempt to ignore or dismiss competing findings. This has been a longstanding problem in the offender prediction and treatment literature (Andrews & Wormith, 1989), the reason being that the under-lying support for prediction and treatment initiatives arises more from psychobiological conceptualizations of behaviour than from the social structure perspectives favoured by the disciplines of sociology and criminology. Psychobiological perspectives have been ridiculed on both moral and professional grounds. For example, some criminologists (e.g., Gibbons, 1986) have claimed that the consequence of psychobiological perspectives is repression and terror. Hirschi and Hindelang (1977) have remarked that the primary motive for dismissing disciplines such as psychology is, basically, the protection of the profession of sociology.

A number of arguments have been generated by knowledge destruction proponents to support anti-prediction and treatment views (see Andrews & Bonta, 1998), and can be generally classified within two types (Gendreau, 1995). The first of these arguments concerns methodology and claims that any prediction/treatment study can easily be dismissed because it relies on imperfect theory; fails to rule out other explanations of the results; has possible errors in measurement; and its reported effects are either not large enough or are due to statistical gymnastics. The second type of argument is more ideological in nature and takes three forms. These are: social problems are intractable, and to think that they can be successfully addressed is to live in a chimerical and utopian world; treatment involves a monopoly of values and requires more control than absolute freedom; and the results found today regarding treatment effectiveness will be irrelevant in the future because of changes in the social context. Obviously, no study can escape the above critiques unscathed. Knowledge destruction arguments will win out every time.

The MBA management syndrome

The final form of theoreticism is the MBA management syndrome in criminal justice (Gendreau, Goggin, & Smith, 2000). Over the years, in government in general and criminal justice in particular, we have witnessed a new generation of high-level corrections administrators who are generalists with little or no training in the helping professions and none in the prediction and treatment of criminal behaviour (Gendreau et al., 2000). It seems that the primary qualification for administrators nowadays is general management experience. It also helps to be a political appointee. And among this new breed of administrator, the few who are well-versed in correctional issues rarely stay long in the job.

In our opinion, the “nothing works” credo has also encouraged the MBA management syndrome. Struckoff (1978) was prescient when he predicted that, in the face of “nothing works”, correctional systems without well-trained professionals would basically become fraudulent. With the demise of rehabilitation, the system is being driven by content-free administrators susceptible to political whim in having to embrace the latest panacea. Fortunately, at the federal level in Canada, the Correctional Service of Canada has not fallen prey to such an insidious development (Gendreau et al., 2000, p. 53).

Although theoreticism is anathema to empiricism, a remedy may be forthcoming from what appear to be, at face value, two more barriers. They include issues of technology transfer and training.

Technology transfer

Technology transfer means getting the necessary information into the hands of those who most need it. Unfortunately, the data in this regard indicates that such information is typically not getting into the hands of practitioners. As a case in point, when it comes to substance abuse treatment programs, it has been reported that neither management policies nor the clinical decision process is based upon readings from professional periodicals (Backer, David, & Soucy, 1995). If practitioners do receive information that mediates their approach to treatment, it tends to come from workshops, and, even then, it is only a relatively small percentage among them who profit. We suspect that this problem is not unique to substance abuse programs.

Nonetheless, there is room for a modicum of hope. There are a few measures and intervention strategies now available to programmers, trainers, and policy makers to better effect technology transfer (Backer et al., 1995; Backer, Liberman, & Kuehnel, 1986). Both Andrews and Gendreau, in common with other Compendium contributors, have been involved in technology transfer at the organizational and practitioner levels, in prison, parole, community corrections, and policy settings. In 1979, we reported on our first 19 attempts at technology transfer (Gendreau & Andrews, 1979), and presently we have several dozen case studies in our files. The following guidelines are based on our retrospective and subjective judgements of the conditions associated with successful attempts at technology transfer. Success, defined as having a new program still operating two years after our technology transfer intervention, occurred when:²

• we were action-oriented and worked “hands on” with staff until they felt secure enough to take over
• the agency had a senior administrator who championed the new initiatives (or if not, we identified such a person and cultivated his/her interest)
• we ensured that the socio-political and program values of the agency were congruent with those of ourselves (as change agents)
• the new initiatives were cost-effective and sustainable.

Such activities, however, are not in themselves sufficient to ensure technology transfer. The opportunity to directly bring about changes in service delivery demands that the knowledge be accessible in the first place. In order to ensure that it is, one must continuously be available to provide workshops, make non-academic conference presentations, encourage responsible media coverage (including being amenable to media appearances), publish newsletters, and use professional associations to lobby for changes within government bureaucracies, private sector organizations, and the body politic.

Training

There are precious few training programs available for people interested in offender treatment. None of the national-level training institutes in the United States specializes in treatment, although they occasionally contract out to experts in the area. No training institutes of this kind exist in Canada. There are several academic-based training programs in the field of law and psychology in the United States, but when we consulted the most recent American Psychological Association graduate training guidelines, only a handful of possibilities for extensive training in clinical work in corrections could be identified.

Yet, even limited exposure can result in measurable impact. For example, implementation of just one program and/or the work of two or three individuals can have a meaningful effect. Some years ago Andrews and Gendreau (1976) initiated an under-graduate training program for corrections, that produced graduates who later went on to work in the field. Psychologists have recently established forensic/law/corrections programs in Ontario and British Columbia (Simourd & Wormith, 1995). We are already reaping the benefits of these programs at the clinical and scholarly levels. That is, criminal justice presentations at the Canadian Psychological Association's annual conferences have increased dramatically in the last five years, and some of the new generation of psychologists are continuing to make research and clinical contributions a priority.

The Department of Justice in New Zealand followed a recommendation (Gendreau & Simpson, 1986) to establish jointly funded government-university training links in correctional psychology. It comes as no surprise that this sort of development, along with the enlightened leadership of psychologists in their Department of Justice, coincides with the fact that correctional psychology is a vibrant discipline in that country and is contributing data that are having an impact on criminal justice policy in that country. Finally, rehabilitation research and practice is beginning to flourish in parts of Germany and Great Britain through the work of a few thoughtful and dedicated psychologists (e.g., Farrington, Hollin, Lösel, McGuire, & Thornton).

In closing, we remain impressed by the fact that most service providers are keen on upgrading their clinical skills. We must give them every opportunity to do so, for it is at this level that change must occur if we are to generate more effective correctional practice.

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¹ University of New Brunswick, Centre for Criminal Justice Studies

² For a more complete description of the factors involved in this area consult Gendreau, Goggin, and Smith (1999).

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REFERENCES

Andrews, D. A., & Bonta, J. (1998). The psychology of criminal conduct (2^nd ed.). Cincinnati, OH: Anderson Publishing Company.

Andrews, D. A., Dowden, C., & Gendreau, P. (1999). Clinically relevant and psychologically informed app roaches to reduced reoffending: A meta-analytic study of human service, risk, need, responsivity, and other concerns in justice contexts. Unpublished manuscript. Ottawa, ON: Carleton University.

Andrews, D. A., & Gendreau, P. (1976). Undergraduate training and correctional service. Professional Psychology, 7, 21-30.

Andrews, D. A., & Wormith, J. S. (1989). Personality and crime: Knowledge destruction and construction in criminology. Justice Quarterly, 6, 289-309.

Backer, T., David, S., & Soucy, G. (Eds.), (1995). Reviewing the behavioral science knowledge base on technology transfer (NIDA Research Monograph 155). Rockville, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, National Institute of Health.

Backer, T. E., Liberman, R. P., & Kuehnel, T. G. (1986). Dissemination and adoption of innovative psychosocial interventions. Journal of Clinical and Consulting Psychology, 54, 111-1 18.

Campbell, D. T. (1969). Reforms as experiments. American Psychologist, 24, 409-428.

Cullen, F. T., Fisher, B. S., & Applegate, B. K. (2000). Public opinion about punishment and corrections. In M. Tonry (Ed.), Crime and justice: A review of research (vol. 27, pp. 59-137). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Cullen, F. T., & Gendreau, P. (1989). The effectiveness of correctional treatment: Reconsidering the “nothing works” debate. In L. Goodstein & D. MacKenzie (Eds.), The American prison: Issues in research and policy (pp. 23-44). New York, NY: Plenum Press.

Cullen, F. T., & Gendreau, P. (2000). Assessing correctional rehabilitation: Policy, practice, and prospects. In J. Horney (Ed.), NIJ criminal justice 2000: Changes in decision making and discretion in the criminal justice system (pp. 109-175). Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice.

Gendreau, P. (1995). Technology transfer in the criminal justice field. In T. Backer, S. Davis, & G. Soucy (Eds.), Reviewing the behavioral science knowledge base on technology transfer (pp.198-208). (NIDA Research Monograph 155). Rockville, MD: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, National Institute of Health.

Gendreau, P. (1996). Offender rehabilitation: What we know and what needs to be done. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 23, 144-16 1.

Gendreau, P. (1999). Rational policies for reforming offenders. ICCA Journal on Community Corrections, 9, 16-20.

Gendreau, P., & Andrews, D. A. (1979). Psychological consultation in correctional agencies: Case studies and general issues. In J. J. Platt & R. W. Wicks (Eds.), The psychological consultant (pp.127-212). New York, NY: Grune & Stralton.

Gendreau, P., & Andrews, D. A. (1996). Correctional Program Assessment Inventory (CPAI) (6^th ed.). Saint John, NB: University of New Brunswick.

Gendreau, P., & Goggin, C. (2000). Correctional treatment: Accomplishments and realities. In P. Van Voorhis, M. Braswell, & D. Lester (Eds.), Correctional counseling and rehabilitation (4^th ed., pp. 289-297). Cincinnati, OH: Anderson Publishing Company.

Gendreau, P., Goggin, C., & Smith, P. (1999). The forgotten issue in effective correctional treatment: Program implementation. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 43, 180-187.

Gendreau, P., Goggin, C., & Smith, P. (2000). Generating rational correctional policies: An introduction to advances in cumulating knowledge. Corrections Management Quarterly, 4, 52-60.

Gendreau, P., Paparozzi, M., Little, T., & Goddard, M. (1993). Does “punishing smarter” work? An assessment of the new generation of alternative sanctions in probation. Forum on Corrections Research, 5(3), 3 1-34.

Gendreau, P., & Ross, R. R. (1979). Effective correctional treatment: Bibliotherapy for cynics. Crime and Delinquency, 25, 463-489.

Gendreau, P., & Ross, R. R. (1987). Revivification of rehabilitation: Evidence from 1980s. Justice Quarterly, 4, 349-407.

Gendreau, P., & Simpson, G. (1986). Ministerial review of psychological services. Wellington, New Zealand: Department of Justice, Government Printers.

Gendreau, P., Smith, P., & Goggin, C. (2001). Treatment programs in corrections. In J. Winterdyk (Ed.), Corrections in Canada: Social reaction to crime (pp. 238-265). Scarborough, ON: Prentice-Hall.

Gibbons, D. C. (1986). Breaking out of prisons. Crime and Delinquency, 32, 503-514.

Hirschi, T., & Hindelang, M. J. (1977). Intelligence and delinquency: A revisionist review. American Sociological Review, 42, 571-587.

Lab, S., & Whitehead, J. (1990). From “nothing works” to the “appropriate works”: The latest step in the search for the secular grail. Criminology, 28, 405-417.

Latessa, E., & Holsinger, A. (1998). The importance of evaluating correctional programs. Assessing outcome and quality. Corrections Management Quarterly, 2, 22-29.

Martinson, R. (1976). California research at the crossroads. In R. Martinson, T. Palmer, & S. Adams (Eds.). Rehabilitation, recidivism and research (pp. 63-74). Hackensack, NJ: National Council on Crime and Delinquency.

Shichor, D. (1995). Punishment f or profit, private prisons/public concerns. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Simourd, D., & Wormith, S. (1995). Criminal justice education and training: A survey of Canadian graduate schools of psychology. Canadian Psychology, 36, 1-8.

Struckhoff, D. R. (1978). Deprofessionalizing corrections is bad business. Offender Rehabilitations, 2, 333-338.

 

CHAPTER 7

Implementation of Effective Correctional Programs

ALAN W. LESCHIED¹

This chapter presents current findings related to program implementation and the replication of successful programs. It provides major findings from the meta-analyses in the context of their significance to implementation issues. Meta-analyses have assisted in developing a science of criminal conduct. Such a science draws not only linking factors that help in the understanding of criminogenic risk levels of certain individuals -- nature and strength -- but also on the literature regarding treatments or systems of service delivery that can promote effective outcomes in correctional practice.

Also outlined are the six organizational requirements that are necessary to support successful implementation efforts. These requirements include: sincere motivation at implementation; support at the top of leadership and each group whose co-operation is required for implementation and use; staff competence; a cost-benefit surplus; clarity of goals and procedures; and, clear lines of authority.

This chapter provides examples of measures of treatment adherence and program compliance, as well as four examples of innovations in communication, and discusses the policy relevance in corrections of successful implementation and the future research efforts in this area.

TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER IN THE HUMAN SERVICE FIELD

The transfer of knowledge in the social and human services from what has largely been an academic-based knowledge to applied settings is challenging not only to correctional professionals, but also to practitioners in a variety of human service settings. The literature chronicles numerous examples of programs that were either well conceived or poorly implemented or well implemented but poorly sustained (Bauman, Stein, & Ireys, 1991). Of course, there is also the suspicion that the failure to implement or sustain programs that have demonstrated effectiveness in research may be tied to the more insidious, cynical intentions of some policy and program “experts”. This has more to do with the unwillingness of such administrators to disavow the knowledge base in a given area and indeed purposefully undermine the integrity of that knowledge. Andrews and Bonta (1998) refer to this intentional undermining as knowledge destruction, a fact identified in both the young offender (Leschied, Jaffe, Andrews, & Gendreau, 1995) and substance abuse literature (Gendreau, 1996). Techniques of knowledge destruction are characterized by the seeming sophistication of argument in using scientific principles to negate scientific fact. Erstwhile, the use of such techniques belays the negative beliefs and attitudes on the part of these commentators. Reductionism is the essence and dismissal is the intent. In the beginning, a careful reading of what is known about successful programs is paramount to success-fully planned program implementation.

In an excellent review of the lessons learned from the literature on successful program implementation, Shore (1988) noted that the implementation of programs is “shaped by powerful forces” that are not easily modified even by “new knowledge”. Indeed, Shore's summary include the necessity of a climate that is “created by skilled, committed professionals respectful and trusting of the clients they serve, regardless of the precepts; demands and boundaries set by professionalism and bureaucracies”. The necessity of providing caring programs, that are coherent and easy to use, providing continuity and circumventing the traditions of limiting professional and bureaucratic limitations were absolutely the prerogative of such effective programs. Gendreau (1996) would add that a senior advocate in an organization who is willing to champion the cause of such a program is an essential ingredient as well.

Powerful forces as Shore calls them are certainly at work in the correction field when it comes to transferring knowledge to practice on a broad scale. Political beliefs that have shaped correctional practice have in many cases been antagonistic to the lessons learned from the literature on effective corrections. Deterrence, sanctions and punishment-based correctional practices and policies have been pre-eminent in the last two decades. This is despite what Palmer (1996) amongst others indicates has been a failure of such programs to demonstrate reductions in offending. Yet, juxtaposed to this emphasis on punishment reflected in correctional policy has been the extraordinary growth in knowledge in the area of effective treatment.

THE NECESSITY OF A KNOWLEDGE-BASED APPROACH

Cullen et al. (1998) cite data suggesting that there continue to be many both within and without the corrections profession who have failed to recognize the growing literature on effective treatment with offender populations. Despite this disappointing lack of awareness, the literature continues to grow, documenting not only progress in regards to the accumulation of evidence of effective interventions, but also the summaries from numerous meta-analyses that now speak to the patterns of effectiveness being documented across studies. Several researchers and practitioners now speak about the need for examining technology transfer; the application of what research has suggested can be effective and translating that knowledge into routine correctional practice.

Coupled with the move to monitor and measure adherence, is the growing emphasis on dissemination of information regarding effective programs. Training is pivotal, combining both the communication of program findings along with the kinds of support and consultation required to insure the effective replication of those programs. Some of the more well articulated interventions such as Multi-Systemic Therapy (Henggeler et al., 1998) are currently developing, along with field input and support, detailed practitioner and supervisor manuals that can assist successful dissemination. Although it must be acknowledged that such higher-level dissemination efforts that are also being evaluated are still relatively rare in the human services and correction field.

OVERVIEW OF MAJOR FINDINGS FROM THE META-ANALYSIS

In mid and latter 1970s, reviews of the program literature in corrections contributed to an extraordinary discussion that became the touchstone to a generation of corrections professionals. The nothing works debate as it is been popularly known, not only became a matter for social scientists to consider, but also played into the hands of policy makers and politicians in criminal justice. Depending upon their particular political leaning, decision makers used the results of such reviews to either proclaim the failure of rehabilitation, thereby perhaps unwittingly heralding the expanded use of get tough measures, or used them to develop the growing science of prediction and treatment in the corrections field. Followers of the debate will now be familiar with the names of Martinson (1976) in the United States and in Canada, Shamsie (1981) whose titles of qualitative reviews of the literature so provocatively proclaimed that “Nothing Worked” and that “Our Treatments Do Not Work: Where Do We Go From Here”. And with each provocation, there was a Paul Gendreau, Robert Ross (1979) or Ted Palmer (1996) who suggested that a more careful reading of the outcome literature would provide “Bibliotherapy for Cynics”.

Two decades have now passed, and with more sophistication in providing quantitative reviews of the prediction and outcome literature, meta-analyses have assisted in developing a science of criminal conduct. Such a science draws not only on linking factors that help in the understanding of criminogenic risk levels of certain individuals -- nature and strength -- but also on the literature regarding treatments or systems of service delivery that can promote effective outcomes in correctional practice.

Contributions from the meta-analyses

There have been a number of contributions to the meta-analysis on correction treatment. Perhaps the most well known are those authored by Andrews and his colleagues (1990) and by Lipsey (Lipsey & Wilson, 1995; Lipsey, 1995). Technical under-standing of the approach taken by these authors will not be provided here. Suffice to say that the quality and nature of the meta-analyses that are reported reflect the quality and number of the studies in the field. Hence, the nature and quality of knowledge could not have been achieved and reported on by Andrews and Lipsey were it not for the efforts of so many who contributed to that knowledge base. Indeed, Leschied and Cunningham (1999) report that the accumulation of published accounts of outcome studies in the youth corrections field has more than tripled in the past ten years when compared to the years prior to 1988.

Major assessment issues

Both cross-sectional and longitudinal studies have identified factors that link past or current conditions with individuals that place them at increasing risk for criminogenic involvement. Andrews and Bonta (1998) summarize that these studies sup-port a social-psychological understanding of criminogenic risk. That is, individuals may cognitively process certain conditions in their environment that develop or reward certain styles or content of thinking that are reflected in anti-social behaviour. Those system variables that influence risk to a greater extent includes families of origin, peer associates and school or working conditions. Data has also supported the link between anti-social behaviour with substance use in the understanding of crime cycles (Huizinga, Menard, & Elliott, 1989). Measures of those factors that contribute most significantly and seem to be attracting the greatest attention in the literature include multi-factored indicators as measured by the Level of Service Inventory (Andrews & Bonta, 1998), criminal sentiments (Simourd & Van de Ven, 1999) and psychopathy (Hare, 1991).

Accurate and relevant assessment of criminogenic risk is tied to the major outcomes from the meta-analysis on effective treatment. While Lipsey has identified the major general contributors to successful correctional programs, Andrews et al.'s principle contribution rests in the refining of understanding regarding the appropriate target of intervention. While Lipsey's results were encouraging regarding the average effect sizes supporting reductions of 10 to 30 per cent in reoffending within particular types of programming (i.e., behavioural over psychodynamic), Andrews' findings that certain program components targeted to specific criminogenic risk factors -- referred to as clinical relevance -- could improve outcomes by an even greater extent. Hence, Andrews articulated the risk principle of case classification as a critical component of effective service thereby linking assessment with service delivery in the overall approach to effective correctional treatment. These findings therefore suggest that assessment of appropriate risk relevant to criminal justice involvement is a necessary and fundamental part of successful program implementation.

GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS FOR SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION

As with any change of strategy in human service, the complexities of factors that need to be addressed in promoting a shift in correctional practice may seem daunting if not absolutely overwhelming to an initiator of program change. Ellickson and Petersilia (1983) identified six principle organizational considerations that were necessary in initiating program implementation in corrections. They included:

• sincere motivation at implementation;
• support at the top of leadership and each group whose co-operation is required for implementation and use;
• staff competence;
• a cost-benefit surplus;
• clarity of goals and procedures;
• clear lines of authority.

In addition, program shifts for implementation in corrections requires the support of both legal and non-legal stakeholders in the community. The courts, as in conflict with the rule of law, may see what may make sense from a program perspective. For example, if justice is seen as too individualized, i.e., sanctions are not seen as proportionate given the nature of the offending, the rule of law may be perceived as under-mined because of the inequity of the severity and nature of the sanction. Clarity in the purpose and role of the courts and other law-related forums need to be seen as complementary to the role and purpose of correctional programs. We can find a progressive example of this type of thinking in the evolution of the declaration of principle in the Young Offenders Act in Canada. Since revisions in 1989, the Act has considered the goal of community safety as a coincidental pursuit in addressing the needs and circumstances of the young offender.

CONTEXTUAL ISSUES IN SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION

Experience in North America over the past two decades has reflected the trend towards incarceration as the correctional policy of choice. Trends in support for incarceration, coupled with the legacy of the nothing works conclusions of reviewers of correctional programs in the early and mid 1970s, created considerable challenges to implement programs that were not predicated simply on adding to the incarceration rate. In many respects, findings from program reviews suggesting that the community was the preferred context in which to deliver effective programs. Hence, development of trends such as intensive probation supervision programs was a tough sell, even though evidence suggested their abilities to influence offending rates. There are two important factors to be considered. The first is to have an awareness of the extant literature on effective practice; to be aware of what is possible in delivering a successful program, and to not oversell the effects of even successful programs. While the general outcome literature is now reporting reductions in offending ranging from 20 to 40 per cent (Andrews et al., 1990; Lipsey & Wilson, 1998) there are some areas of correctional practice where data has not supported claims of effectiveness. One such area is related to outcomes with psychopathic individuals.

The second critical consideration in promoting program implementation is knowledge of willingness, and level of acceptance of policy makers, correctional professionals, and the immediate community to accept a shift in policy. Petersilia as cited in Harris and Smith (1996) suggests, “Unless a community recognizes or accepts the premise that a change in corrections is needed, is affordable, and does not conflict with its sentiments regarding just punishment, an innovative project has little hope of surviving much less succeeding”.

Community versus residential context for treatment

While there seems to be some minor variations in interpretation of the effects of the immediate context to support implementation of programs, as a general statement, community contexts seem more able to support effective outcomes when compared to programs delivered in residential contexts (Andrews & Bonta, 1998). Henggeler and his colleagues argue that treating high risk youth in the community is a more ecologically valid approach to assess and treat them since it allows for an increased opportunity to work directly with the systems that are both influencing and being influenced by the behaviour of their families and peers. Hoge, Leschied, and Andrews (1993) in a study on the components in young offender programs found that factors in agreement with items related to effective correctional practice were more likely to be identified in community programs than in residential programs.

EMPIRICAL FINDINGS RELATED TO IMPLEMENTATION

The evolution of research development in the correction field has only recently emphasized the importance of providing out-come evaluation as a standard in service delivery. Indeed one of the somewhat surprising findings reported in Andrews et al. is the fact that programs that were being evaluated by those charged with their implementation were actually characterized through their outcomes as more effective than those that were not being as closely monitored. Hence it would seem that evaluation could also be characterized as a factor in successful implementation. Monitoring for program implementation however has not met with the same level of development. This section will highlight two examples of implementation evaluation which serve to assist in understanding programs that are relatively successful in identifying effective implementation strategies.

Treatment adherence

For any experienced corrections professional, it will come as no surprise that implementation, while critical, is only a part of any success story. The real challenge arises in trying to implement a program consistent with the components reflecting an effective strategy -- referred to as program integrity (Andrews & Hill, 1990) and to support those factors that can sustain a program after it has shown itself to be effective.

Multi-systemic therapy

Henggeler and his associates at the Medical University of South Carolina have turned their attention not only to program contents that are effective with high-risk youth, but also to those factors that can sustain an effective program over the longer term.

A brief overview of Multi-systemic therapy (MST) suggests that a therapeutic focus on certain systemic factors within the lives of highly conflicted youth will be rewarded with significant reductions in youth criminal activity. Results from Henggeler et al. (1997) revealed that while some treatment gains were sustained in some youths, others were not. Further analysis by the authors indicated that program sustainability was tied to the presence of certain therapist/program characteristics that in turn characterized specific components of the MST model. The conclusion of this study suggested that to achieve sustainability of positive outcomes from intervention, adequate and on-going training and consultation was necessary. Further, these authors developed the Therapist Adherence Measure (TAM) which consists of 26 items that ask family members to rate their therapist on items that would reflect consistency of the intervention with the principles of MST. Computer scoring with the TAM allows for a relatively short turn around time to provide a quantified summary to the therapist and their supervisor regarding how consistent the intervention was provided on a case by case basis. Data suggests that therapist adherence is positively correlated with client outcomes. The development of similar adherence measures particular to a given intervention is possible given clearly identified and well articulated aspects of the nature of the intervention and type of service delivery.

Program compliance

While studies such as with MST examine treatment adherence at the therapist level, another line of investigation recommends evaluating a program's ability to comply with pre-set conditions that evidence has suggested are consistent with overall components of effective programs.

Correctional Program Assessment Inventory

The Correctional Program Assessment Inventory (CPAI) (Gendreau & Andrews, 1996) is an inventory developed out of the meta-analysis literature on effective programs. It consists of seventy-five items covering eight components critical to the understanding of what constitutes an effective program, along with two areas that are considered integral to effective programs, namely emphasis on evaluation and ethical considerations.

The components consist of: program implementation, client pre-service assessment, program characteristics, staff characteristics, evaluation and other (i.e., ethical consideration). All of the components and the questions asked of programs consist of factors influenced by the reviews of the effective correction literature. Table 7.1 summarizes the eight components of the CPAI.

TABLE 7.1 Summary of the CPAI components
Scale	Scale description
Program Implementation	Surveys the conditions under which the program was introduced.
Preservice assessment	Surveys applications of the principle of risk, need and responsivity.
Program characteristics	Assesses targeting of criminogenic factors and the use of cognitive behavioural techniques.
Therapeutic integrity	Surveys service delivery, emphasizing intensity and matching conditions.
Relapse prevention	Surveys extent to which programs focus on post-release programs.
Staff characteristics	Surveys staff and training issues.
Evaluation	Examines the extent to which the system emphasizes/encourages research and evaluation activities.
Other	Assesses emphasis on ethical concerns and security of program funding.

In a review of young offender programs in one jurisdiction, Hoge, Leschied, and Andrews (1993) examined over one hundred programs measured by the extent and nature of components on the CPAI. Data reflected the range of program components that were available and where they tended to reside suggesting that the presence of programs with higher scores on the important scales from the CPAI tended to be in the community as opposed to custody. Further analysis using a measure such as the CPAI can identify training and staff needs, movement of service from residential to community approaches in capitalizing on the strengths of certain programs. While the authors would defer that measures such as the CPAI should not be held as a “gold standard”, nonetheless, such a measure holds promise in assessing programs on a broad scale.

ISSUES IN DISSEMINATION AND TRAINING

As programs generally, and correctional programs in particular move to higher levels of accountability, the movement towards standards of practice and compliance reviews will be encouraged. Indeed, in the next two years, Correctional Service Canada will be moving towards adopting a set of standards to guide the content and delivery of programs. The increasing challenge therefore will be to move the developing knowledge to the field in order to implement effective correctional practices, and to look to innovative ways to communicate this knowledge in order to support change at the policy and practitioner level. These four innovations in communication in corrections are worth note as examples:

• RCJNet is a list serve website that communicates to numerous correction processionals about knowledge in the correction field. The service provides website links, summaries of recent justice documents, or summaries of research that may be of interest. Using latest technology, RCJNet serves as a clearinghouse for current correctional information. The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention out of Washington DC serves a similar purpose in the United States in making current documents available on line for wide spread dissemination.
• The National Institute of Justice has initiated a distance education program providing learning opportunities to correctional professionals through a system of centres connected through satellite-linked communications systems. From a single source, unlimited numbers of practitioners and policy makers across a limitless geographic area can interact with the leaders in the field in hearing of new pro-gram or policy ideas.
• The London Family Court Clinic, along with Multi-Systemic Therapy (MST) Services Incorporated in Charleston, South Carolina, has developed an interactive website that links MST teams across North America and Europe. Practitioners using MST are able to communicate with one another with respect to promising therapeutic approaches or clinical issues that may arise in the course of service delivery. Recently, the development of a MST clinical team in Norway was able to link to the Ontario teams. Collegial supervision takes on new meaning in this.
• The Toronto-based Institute for Anti-Social and Violent Youth has, for close to twenty-five years, provided an extracting and commentary service on articles of particular interest to the young offender field. Such services help to focus and summarize information of particular currency and relevance to the field by reviewing articles from major journals.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

Implementation of programs is a challenging prospect. What correctional professionals have going for them however is a knowledge base that supports certain programs and policies over others with the goal towards increasing community safety. This chapter has highlighted the major issues in implementation as being:

• An acknowledgement of the literature on what works for effective corrections and policy practices. This literature highlights appropriate assessment strategies that increase the potential for interventions to be clinically relevant to factors that influence criminogenic risk.
• Identification of contextual factors that can influence the probability that program innovation will be successfully introduced. These factors include leadership support for implementation, staff competence and goal clarification for the reasons behind implementation.
• Specific contextual factors influence successful implementation. Current knowledge suggests that different factors influence successful community-based implementation versus residential-based implementation.
• Measures for both treatment adherence and program compliance have been developed to evaluate and monitor the degree of success in program implementation.
• Training and dissemination is now considered the great challenge facing implementation in the correction field. Arguably what could shape the next generation of corrections professionals is the challenge of communicating the knowledge on effective strategies to practitioners. Using cur-rent technology, clearinghouse extracting services, the inter-net and interactive communication technology are all examples of methods in communicating that knowledge to those who make decisions both for policy and for practice.

And as Shore (1991) cited almost a decade ago, “...It is essential in order to institutionalize these effective interventions, to find better ways of maintaining accountability and achieving credibility by becoming a part of the shift toward outcome accountability, outcome-focussed assessment”. (p. 3).

Once we have the knowledge, choose to implement those things that have shown themselves to be effective, communicate those findings to the field, the obligation remains to evaluate the effects of those interventions towards those we have directed our knowledge.

Lastly, as work continues to document effective strategies in reducing offending, larger scale dissemination efforts need to be evaluated and refined. My experience in supporting MST dissemination and development of programs in Ontario across four geographically diverse sites has supported the belief that large scale efforts with co-operation across sites enlisting the support of the programs' initiators is possible. However, what remains to be evaluated is the potential sustainability of such efforts with what degree of effort in on-going training and consultation. This question will in part be addressed in the National Institute of Justice study that is underway.

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¹ University of Western Ontario, Faculty of Education, and The Family Court Clinic

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REFERENCES

Andrews, D. A., Zinger, I., Hoge, R. D., Bonta, J., Gendreau, P., & Cullen, F. (1990). Does correctional treatment work? A clinically-relevant and psychologically-informed meta-analysis. Criminology, 28, 369-404.

Andrews, D. A., & Bonta, J. (1998). The psychology of criminal conduct (Second Edition). Cincinnati, OH: Anderson Publishing.

Bauman, L. J., Stein, R. E. K., & Ireys, H. T. (1991). Reinventing fidelity: The transfer of social technology among settings. American Journal of Community Psychology, 19(4), 619-639.

Cullen, F. T., Wright, J. P., Brown, S., Moon, M. M., Blankenship, M. B., & Applegate, B. K. (1998). Attitudes toward prevention. Crime and Delinquency, 44( 2), 187-204.

Ellickson, P., & Petersilia, J. (1983). Implementing new ideas in criminal justice. Santa Monica, CA: The Rand Corporation.

Gendreau, P., & Andrews, D. A. (1996). Correctional Program Assessment Inventory. St. John, NB: University of New Brunswick.

Gendreau, P., & Ross, R. R. (1979). Effective correctional treatment: Bibliotherapy for cynics. Crime and Delinquency, 21, 463-489.

Hare, R. (1991). The Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised. Toronto, ON: Multi Health Systems.

Harris, P., & Smith, S. (1996). Developing community corrections: An Implementation perspective. In A. T. Harland (Ed.) Choosing correctional options that work: Defining the demand and evaluating the supply (pp. 183-222). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Henggeler, S. W., Schoenwald, S. K., Bourduin, C. M., Rowland, M. D., & Cunningham, P. B. (1998). Multisystemic treatment of antisocial behaviour in children and adolescents. New York, NY: The Guildford Press.

Henggeler, S. W., Melton, G. B., Brondino, M. J., Scherer, D. G., & Hanley, J. H. (1997). Multisystemic therapy with violent and chronic juvenile offenders and their families: The role of treatment fidelity and successful dissemination. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 65(5), 821-833.

Hoge, R. D., Leschied, A. W., & Andrews, D. A. (1993). An investigation of young offender services in the province of Ontario: A report of the repeat offender project. Toronto, ON: Ministry of Community and Social Services.

Huizinga, D. H., Menard, S., & Elliott, D. S. (1989). Delinquency and drug use: Temporal and developmental patterns. Justice Quarterly, 6(3), 419-45 5.

Leschied, A. W., & Cunningham, A. (1999). A community-based alternative for high-risk young offenders. Forum on Corrections Research 11(2), 25-29.

Leschied, A. W., Jaffe, D. G., Andrews, D. A., & Gendreau, P. (1995). Treatment issues and young offenders: An empirically derived vision of Canadian juvenile justice. In R. Corrado, N. Bala, R. Linden, & M. Leblanc (Eds.) Juvenile justice in Canada: Theoretical and analytical assessment (pp. 347-366). Toronto, ON: Butterworths.

Lipsey, M. W. (1995). What do we learn from 400 research studies on the effectiveness of treatment with juvenile delinquents. In J. McGuire (Ed.) What works: Reducing offending (pp. 63-78). Chichester, UK: John Wiley and Sons.

Lipsey, M. W., & Wilson, D. B. (1998). Effective interventions for serious juvenile offenders: A syntheses of research. In R. Loeber & D. P. Farrington (Eds.) Serious and violent offenders: Risk factors and successful interventions (pp. 313-366). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Lösel, F. (1998). Treatment and management of psychopaths. In D. J. Cooke, A. Forth, & R. B. Hare (Eds.) Psychopathy: Theory, research and implications for society (pp. 303-354). The Hague, Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

Martinson, R. (1979). What works: Questions and answers about prison reform. The Public Interest, 35, 22-54.

Palmer, T. (1996). Programmatic and nonprogrammatic aspects of successful implementation. In A. T. Harland (Ed.) Choosing correctional options that work: Defining the demand and evaluating the supply (pp. 13 1-182). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Shamsie, J. (1981). Our treatments do not work, where do we go from here? Canadian Journal of Psychiatry. 26, 357-364

Shore, L. B. (1988). Within our reach: Breaking the cycle of disadvantage. New York, NY: Doubleday Publications.

Shore, L. B. (1991). Successful programs: From moving models to moving mountains. Presented to the “Empowering Families” Conference. St. Louis, Missouri. December 7, 1991.

Simourd, D., & Van de Ven, J. (1999). Assessment of criminal attitudes: Criterion-related validity of the criminal sentiments scale-modified and pride in delinquency scale. Criminal Justice and Behaviour, 26(1), 90-106.

 

CHAPTER 8

Addressing Treatment Resistence in Corrections

DENISE L. PRESTON¹

Treatment resistance, while ubiquitous, has a negative impact on treatment outcome, in terms of poorer compliance regarding attendance and performance and reduced treatment gains. Given that the primary outcome anticipated from correctional intervention is the protection of the public, efforts to reduce treatment resistance are paramount.

This chapter reviews the history and evolution of the concept of resistance, describes various reasons for and manifestations of resistance, discusses assessment issues pertinent to resistance, and suggest strategies to reduce resistance.² This chapter also describes treatment engagement strategies employed in a specific Correctional Service of Canada intervention, the Persistently Violent Offender treatment program (Serin, 1995).

I will use the terms, clinician and client, as opposed to therapist and patient throughout the chapter. These terms, while not ideal, are more encompassing of the multitude of disciplines and professional relationships that are affected by treatment resistance.

HISTORY OF RESISTANCE

Resistance to behaviour change is not a new concept. It has been evident in virtually every healing process since the earliest human cultures. Shamans and priests, who acted as healers in earlier times, recognized the importance of inducing people into the healing process. Ancient philosophers also observed various forms of resistance.

Although it has been observed throughout the ages, Freud originated the term resistance as it applies to modern psycho-therapy. He viewed it as an unconscious or intra-psychic event that was manifested in a variety of defence mechanisms intended to protect clients from becoming aware of unacceptable thoughts and impulses. Behaviour change was not thought to be possible until clients were freed from their pathological conflicts through the elimination of resistance. Thus the elimination of resistance became the cornerstone of psychoanalytic therapies and psychoanalysts addressed resistance directly.

Phenomenological theorists also postulated that resistance serves a self-protective function for clients. In contrast, however, they believed that resistance could best be eliminated through the development of a strong, positive therapeutic relationship and that such a relationship was best fostered by clinicians maintaining an attitude of unconditional positive regard toward clients. Thus, while the elimination of resistance was an important goal, it was addressed indirectly.

Behaviourists view resistance as evidence of counter-control or non-compliance. While they do not make assumptions about the purpose that the counter-control serves or the client's motives for engaging in it, they attempt to reduce it by changing the contingencies that maintain it.

Cognitive theorists propose that resistance occurs due to distorted thinking on the part of clients. For example, it stems from clients' cognitive rejection of explanations of self that are inconsistent with their pre-existing schema. Although they advocate the use of cognitive-restructuring techniques such as Rational Emotive Therapy (Ellis, 1985) to reduce resistance, they note that the degree of resistance and the reasons for it are constantly changing, necessitating varied approaches.

Each of the theories presented so far views resistance as residing within the client. In contrast, systems theorists view resistance as an interaction of the components in the system being treated. Depending on the type of treatment, whether individual, couples, family, or group, and the location of treatment, whether in-patient or out-patient, there could be numerous components contributing to resistance. This includes the identified client, the client's spouse or family, peers, and environment. It also includes the clinician. To reduce resistance, systems theorists propose a number of strategies, after first identifying the source(s) of the resistance.

Several things are evident from the foregoing review. First, no single psychotherapeutic theory fully explains and addresses resistance. Each one presents a different definition of resistance and offers different approaches to its reduction. Second, despite their differences, the theories all recognize the occurrence of resistance as normal, natural, and predictable. Third, all the theories recognize the reduction of resistance as likely the most important problem of psychotherapy. Finally, the definition of resistance has evolved over time from a static, uni-dimensional, intra-psychic force to a dynamic, multi-dimensional, interactive process. While various definitions have been put forth, the most commonly accepted one seems to be the one proposed by Greenson (1967). He defined resistance as “all those conscious or unconscious emotions, attitudes, ideas, thoughts or actions which operate against the progress of therapy”. This definition encompasses all the components of the multi-dimensional view of resistance.

This shift in perspective from considering resistance to be a static, uni-dimensional concept residing within clients to a dynamic, multi-dimensional concept is mirrored in contemporary thinking about motivation, the converse of resistance. Motivation has traditionally been viewed in a static way as a relatively fixed personality trait. Clients are viewed as either resistant or motivated and clinicians are reluctant to work with them until and unless they somehow become motivated. More recently, motivation has come to be viewed in a dynamic way as a state of readiness to change. Conceptualized this way, the purpose of therapy is to move clients from one state to another by reducing defensiveness and resistance at every stage. Evidently, what clinicians do to facilitate movement between states depends on the client's state of readiness at the start of treatment. Similarly, the amount of progress demonstrated in moving clients from one state to another depends on the client's state when treatment begins (Prochaska, DiClemente, & Norcross, 1992).

TYPES OF RESISTANCE

Given the frequency with which resistance is observed in all forms of psychotherapy, it is not surprising that many clinicians and researchers have attempted to categorize it along several dimensions. Some of these dimensions are the stage at which the resistance occurs, the form it takes, and the reason(s) for it. Related to timing, for example, one classification scheme identifies four types of resistance: initial resistance, halfway resistance, inertia resistance, and resistance to termination.

Initial resistance often takes the form of attendance problems, testing of limits, and challenges to clinician credentials. It is possibly the most important type of resistance to handle both quickly and effectively as statistics indicate that up to 50% of clients drop out of treatment after the first session.

Halfway resistance occurs during the action phase of treatment when clients are being most challenged to implement behavioural changes. This is also the “storming” stage of treatment (Goldstein, 1988) where clients typically begin to become frustrated with the process of treatment, with fellow clients in a group setting, and with clinicians. Halfway resistance takes many forms, including a recurrence of attendance problems, reduced compliance with homework, frustration, and expressing the desire to quit.

Inertia resistance occurs after about six months of treatment. It is described as the client's attempt to preserve the status quo by resisting further intervention and change. Because inertia resistance takes many forms similar to halfway resistance, it appears to be difficult to separate the two types. As well, it may be difficult to separate it from the fact that clients may legitimately have arrived at a treatment plateau, given statistics suggesting little therapeutic gain for most clients after about 25 sessions.

Resistance to termination is manifested in clients suddenly becoming “sick” again, or relapsing to earlier dysfunctional behaviours in an effort to maintain contact with clinicians.

Another classification scheme related to timing looks specifically at on-going forms of resistance. Two types of resistance are noted: resistance to progress or to change and resistance to co-operation. These would likely be subsumed under all but resistance to termination in the foregoing scheme.

Related to the form resistance takes, the most encompassing scheme identifies two broad forms: behavioural and communication. Behavioural resistance can be demonstrated by a myriad of examples such as attendance and punctuality problems, non-compliance with homework, frequent client requests for favours, intimidating actions, and, in some cases, “model” behaviour demonstrated by unobtrusively resistant clients. Communication resistance affects response quantity, content, and style. Response quantity refers to the amount of information clients reveal while response content refers to the nature of what clients reveal. Resistant clients often reveal very little or very little of any relevance. Response style refers to the way in which clients communicate. It includes being silent, a monopolist, argumentative, and unwilling to talk. It also includes interrupting, ignoring, and denying.

While these classification attempts are useful, none of them have been empirically developed or validated. This is likely due to difficulty in operationally defining concepts such as resistance and motivation. This, in turn, makes the measurement of such concepts difficult. Various measurement strategies have been employed to-date, including self-reports, self-monitoring, behavioural observations, and measures of treatment outcome, but none is ideal. Clearly, the development of theoretically relevant, empirically sound, and clinically useful measures of both resistance and motivation would be important. This would also enable an examination of issues related to motivation such as the relative importance of the degree of change in motivation during treatment as compared to the attainment of a minimum “threshold” level of motivation either prior to or during treatment. Related to the difficulty in operationally defining resistance is that each scheme conceptualizes resistance in a slightly different way. This is not surprising given different theoretical perspectives of researchers and different definitions of resistance, however operationalized. This suggests that each one would recommend different strategies to reduce resistance.

Another limitation of these attempts is that the categories suggested by the schemes related to timing do not appear to be mutually exclusive. Inertia resistance seems quite similar to halfway resistance and on-going resistance could be subsumed by all but resistance to termination. Nor do the same schemes appear to be exhaustive, given the numerous types of resistance suggested by the scheme related to form. Related to this, none of the schemes include a category of “legitimate” resistance, alluded to by the possibility that inertia resistance could simply indicate a treatment plateau. Also included in this category would be clients' legitimate rejection of poor advice or treatment techniques inconsistent with their personal or cultural backgrounds.

Finally, although the classification scheme related to form encompasses a broad range of client behaviours and communications, it does not address the underlying reasons for these forms of resistance. A further complication is that in many cases it is difficult to separate the form from the reason. All of this suggests that a classification scheme that incorporates both the form of and the reason for the resistance would be important if subsequent efforts to reduce resistance are to be effective.

REASONS FOR RESISTANCE

Resistance can stem from the following five sources: the client, the treatment or techniques employed, the environment, the clinician, and the client-clinician relationship.

Clients variables

Scores of client variables have been related to resistance. Some are legitimate in that they naturally and predictably occur, while others occur as deliberate attempts to subvert therapy. They can be classified into the following subgroups:

• disorder;
• personality;
• behavioural;
• client fears; and
• client self-serving.

However, there is considerable overlap between subgroups in that some client behaviours may stem from personality variables which, in turn, stem from particular disorders.

Disorder variables -- The very nature of certain disorders often predisposes clients to be resistant to treatment efforts. Most often, this is related to how the disorder affects clients' abilities to trust. These disorders include borderline, anti-social, narcissistic, and paranoid personality disorders, psychopathy, schizophrenia, organic or neurological disorders, intellectual deficits, and substance abuse.

Personality variables -- Clients who are hostile, defensive, demanding, and rebellious are resistant to intervention. So are those who reject authority, have an extreme sense of entitlement, and an excessive need for control. Finally, those with an eternal locus of control such that they deny, minimize, or externalize blame are also resistant to intervention.

Behavioural variables -- Numerous client behaviours contribute to resistance. These include lack of motivation to change and failure to see personal problems as serious. These also include various skills deficits, anger, aggression, and violence, and being suicidal.

Client fears variables -- A variety of client fears are related to resistance. Some reflect a lack of understanding of the nature of therapy while some serve a self-protective function. For example, clients may fear a lack of confidentiality in the therapeutic relationship. They may also fear being expected to do something they do not want to do or learning something about themselves that they would rather not learn. They may also fear change itself or have a fear of success. Related to fears serving a self-protective function, clients may fear intervention as they feel considerable anxiety, guilt, or shame about the behaviour in question. Or, they may feel hope-less about their ability to change.

Clients self-serving variables -- Clients may be resistant for various self-serving reasons. For example, they may experience secondary gains from the dysfunctional behaviour that is being targeted in treatment. Or, they may have other hidden agendas to justify continuing to behave the way they do.

Treatment variables

Although evidence seems to suggest that, to clients, the process of therapy is more important in inducing change than the technique, treatment variables can have an impact on resistance. Most obviously, a poor match between type of treatment or treatment techniques and clients does not bode well for behaviour change. For example, verbal therapies, abstract concepts, and written homework would likely lead to resistance on the part of low functioning, illiterate, inarticulate clients. Related to this, client dissatisfaction with treatment is related to resistance, although there is only a moderate relationship between client satisfaction and outcome.

Group size can also affect client resistance and treatment out-come. Smaller groups result in clients communicating only to the clinician as opposed to each other, effectively eliminating the potential benefits of group treatment. Larger groups result in quiet members blending in, loud or aggressive members dominating, reduced consensus, and increased client dissatisfaction. On-going conflict in the group also tends to increase client resistance.

Treatments of shorter duration tend to result in less client resistance and, although there is no significant difference in the amount of resistance encountered by various types of therapies, behavioural therapies seem to engender slightly less resistance than others.

Environment variables

Various environment variables maintain or promote client resistance. Cultural disparities between clients and clinicians can have a negative impact on resistance as can clinicians' failure to understand culturally defined client behaviours. Low socio-economic status can also have a negative effect on client resistance, primarily due to lowered client expectations of their need for and ability to change. As well, poor social support systems can serve to maintain client resistance. The setting in which treatment is provided can also engender client resistance. This is particularly true if the setting is a negative one or if clients are institutionalized and possibly attending treatment involuntarily.

Clinician variables

There has been little systematic research looking at the impact of clinician qualities on the therapeutic process, and on client resistance. As with attempts to measure the concepts of resistance and motivation, the lack of research may be related to difficulties defining and operationalizing seemingly relevant clinician qualities. It may also be related to difficulties measuring clinician qualities due to the controversial and potentially threatening nature of such a task. It may also reflect a fundamental attribution error. That is, clinicians may be more likely to take credit for treatment successes, as indicated by successful reduction or elimination of resistance, than treatment failures, indicated by continued resistance. Lack of research notwithstanding, several clinician qualities have been suggested to contribute to client resistance. These can be divided into the following two sets.

The first set of clinician qualities contributing to resistance is independent of the existence of client resistance. That is, in such cases, clients may or may not demonstrate resistance, but clinicians may erroneously conclude that they are due to their own cognitive or perceptual distortions. First, clinicians may fall prey to a confirmation bias. They may believe that resistance is an inevitable part of all therapeutic interventions, therefore they may be inclined to over-interpret some client behaviours as examples of resistance. Second, clinicians may impose various roles upon clients such as the role of “sick” person. If clients disagree with the imposition of any roles or of particular roles, they may be viewed as being resistant. Third, clinicians may impose their values on clients and may then view clients who disagree as being resistant. Fourth, clinicians may have other expectations or demands of clients that, if legitimately resisted by clients, may be viewed as resistance. This is particularly true if clinicians and clients disagree on treatment goals and techniques.

The second set of clinician qualities has a negative impact on client resistance. In these cases, client resistance is evident, but clinicians respond in ways that exacerbate the situation. First, clinicians that are confrontational in their approach to clients are often met with increased resistance (Murphy & Baxter, 1997). So are those who fail to moderate their feedback to clients with poor self-concepts. Second, clinicians that criticize or blame clients, even subtly, have a negative effect on therapeutic out-come. Third, clinicians that provide little guidance to clients early in sessions fail to reduce client resistance. So do those that prematurely label clients' unconscious motivations rather than gather information or reflect feelings (Murphy & Baxter, 1997). Finally, clinicians with poor relationship skills fail to effectively reduce client resistance.

Client-clinician relationship

In some respects, it is difficult to separate the client-clinician relationship variables from client variables and clinician variables as, ultimately, both sets of factors have their impact on the client-clinician relationship. Nevertheless this relationship, here-after referred to as the therapeutic alliance, and variables affecting it are considered separately because of the importance of the therapeutic alliance to client resistance and therapeutic outcome.

Clinical researchers have written extensively about the therapeutic alliance. They have noted that the therapeutic alliance is likely to be the most important factor related to compliance with treatment. It accounts for most of the variance in treatment out-come, and is the strongest predictor of outcome in brief dynamic and client-centred therapies.³

The development of a therapeutic alliance is contingent upon both client and clinician variables. Related to clients, therapeutic alliance depends upon clients' commitment to treatment, working capacity, and ability to establish healthy interpersonal relationships. Obviously, factors described in the client variables section, including hostility, defensiveness, and mistrust, impair clients' interpersonal functioning. Client perceptions and opinions are also important. These include their perceptions of the openness and friendliness of the clinician, of being treated with respect, and the degree to which they feel they can trust the clinician. These also include perceptions of being actively involved in the treatment plan, feeling that their expectations are being met, and being satisfied with both the clinician and treatment.

Related to clinicians, therapeutic alliance depends upon qualities such as competence, empathy, sincerity, and acceptance of clients. It also depends upon the degree to which clinicians can motivate clients and the type and quality of communication with clients. Also important are negative clinician attributes such as highly moralistic and judgmental attitudes toward clients, clinician interpersonal or relationship problems, erroneous clinician perceptions of clients as resistant, and counter-transference issues. In particular, difficult and resistant clients tend to make clinicians feel rejected, threatened, frustrated, and angry. These feelings can impair clinicians' abilities to develop a therapeutic relationship.

STRATEGIES TO REDUCE RESISTANCE

Clinicians should select intervention strategies only after careful analysis of the form of resistance clients are demonstrating, the likely reasons for the resistance, their relationship with clients, and when in the therapeutic relationship the resistance is manifested. Due to the sheer number of combinations this level of analysis can potentially yield, it is impossible to prescribe specific techniques for every possible manifestation of resistance. Instead, this section will list various strategies to try for any given form of and reason for client resistance. Often, it will be necessary to employ several techniques, either concurrently or successively. In all cases, however, two things should be kept in mind. First, the ultimate goal of the selected strategy is to reduce resistance, enhance motivation, and facilitate treatment gains. Second, it is important to work with rather than against resistance.

Prochaska, DiClemente, and Norcross (1992) conceptualize motivation as a four-stage process. In the precontemplation stage, clients do not see themselves as having any problems requiring attention or, if they do, they have no immediate intention of making any changes. Those who enter treatment at this stage typically do so under duress, are less open, and put forth little effort. They are also typically quick to relapse to maladaptive behaviours. In the second stage, contemplation, clients are aware that they have problems requiring attention, but waver between taking no immediate action and expressing and/or demonstrating some commitment to change. In the action stage, clients have made a commitment to change and actively begin modifying their behaviour, experiences, and environments. Finally, in maintenance, clients have made significant behavioural changes and are actively working to prevent relapse. This model implies clinicians should expend both time and effort prior to and early in treatment motivating clients to move from precontemplation to contemplation to action, if necessary.

Strategies for reducing client-related resistance

Given the relationship of resistance to dropout rates, it is important to effectively address it early on. One possibility is to provide treatment priming or pre-therapy sessions prior to the commencement of a particular course of treatment. This could be provided on an individual or group basis. Advantages of the former are that clients might feel more comfortable in a one-on-one situation and therapeutic alliances would likely develop more readily. Advantages of the latter are that clients would have an opportunity to become familiar with fellow clients prior to the commencement of the formal group, clinicians would have an opportunity to assess group dynamics to take such observations into consideration in delivering the treatment program, and cost-effectiveness. In addition to the advantages of each of these formats, providing priming sessions would orient clients to the expectations of treatment and should facilitate more rapid and extensive treatment gain.

If priming sessions are not a possibility or if they are not completely successful, resistance will have to be addressed early in treatment. It is best not to address resistance directly in the first session, as that should be a non-threatening opportunity for clients and clinicians to formulate initial, hopefully positive, impressions of each other. Following this, however, numerous strategies could prove beneficial depending on the nature of and reason for the resistance. If clients are resisting due to particular fears, normalizing their fears and anxieties could provide some relief. Positive re-framing of uncertainty as a sign that some of their coping strategies are no longer adequate could also provide relief. Similarly, positive re-framing of treatment as an opportunity to change and grow may reassure them. If these tactics do not work, relaxation training may be advisable. Reducing hopelessness and demoralization through the provision of unconditional positive regard may help. So might identifying and reinforcing their use of positive coping strategies. Making initial demands as simple as possible will maximize the likelihood of both compliance and success, both of which should encourage clients. Subsequent demands can be made progressively more difficult as clients progress. Assisting them to consider the costs and benefits of changing versus maintaining the status quo could help. Clinicians can do this by inviting clients to consider alternative perspectives and information. They should provide information and feedback about clients' current situations and the consequences of maintaining their current behaviour. They should also provide information about the likely advantages of changing. In providing such information, clinicians are, in effect, attempting to develop a discrepancy between clients' current behaviour and important personal goals such that clients begin to shift their “motivational balance” in favour of the pros of changing versus those of the status quo.

If clients are resisting for reasons other than fear, other strategies are possible. For example, removing practical obstacles to treatment, such as scheduling appointments or groups at convenient times can help. Clinicians should, however, maintain a balance between active helping and having clients assume responsibility for behaviour change. Limit-setting with respect to attendance, participation, and behaviour is typically both warranted and useful. Sometimes, behavioural contracting may be necessary to enforce limits. Medication may be helpful if resistance is occur-ring because of a mental disorder. Moral reconation therapy, a form of moral reasoning (Little & Robinson, 1988), may also be helpful when resistance is occurring due to deficits in clients' moral reasoning. If resistance is occurring at particular stages of treatment, such as during the “storming stage”, it may help to explain the stages of treatment to normalize its occurrence.

When resistance is ongoing, as in repeated statements challenging clinician credibility or program integrity, clinicians have several options as to how to address it, either individually or in-group sessions. They can attempt to respond specifically to the content of what clients are saying. While this may be helpful in certain circumstances, it can also exacerbate the situation as clients may then resist what the clinician has said. In effect, the specific content of clients' challenges is a red herring. They can respond to the process of the challenge either directly or indirectly. In the former case, clinicians can label clients' behaviour as resistance and use this as a forum for further discussion. However, clients may resist such a direct approach. In the latter case, clinicians can make an observation such as “I've noticed that when we discuss X, you do Y” and then ask clients for an explanation. This is most often the least threatening means of addressing resistance. Third, they can sidetrack on-going resistant behaviours by deflecting challenges or changing topics. This can be an effective way of defusing resistance in a specific situation, but it may not have the effect of eliminating resistance over the long-term. In attempting to address on-going resistance in a group format, it may help to enlist other clients in the group in the discussion. This is because resistant clients may be less defensive with their peers than with clinicians.

Finally, if resistance is ongoing and repeated attempts have failed to reduce it, it may be necessary to terminate clients from treatment. This is particularly true if the ongoing resistance is interfering with the progress of other clients. Termination from treatment should be carefully considered, however, as it may serve to reinforce clients' use of resistant behaviours to avoid taking responsibility for other problematic behaviours. It may also reinforce their notions of power in relationships either because they have successfully used intimidation to get what they want or clinicians may use their authority to control clients. As well, clients may feel further misunderstood and rejected.

Strategies for reducing treatment-related resistance

Clinicians should strive to achieve the best match between clients and treatment. This includes careful consideration of client characteristics such as intelligence, learning style, and symptom severity. This also includes careful consideration of treatment specifics such as its form (individual or group), group size (8 to 12 is ideal), type (behavioural or psychodynamic, for example), intensity, and duration. Wherever possible, client preferences should be taken into consideration.

Clients should be actively involved in developing their treatment plan, setting treatment goals, and selecting treatment techniques to achieve their goals. Plans, goals, and techniques imposed by clinicians will likely engender client resistance with the end result of limiting treatment outcome. The agreed-upon goals must be reasonable, attainable, and pro-social and clinicians should provide regular feedback concerning clients' attempts to achieve their goals.

On-going conflict in the group can be handled in a couple of ways. Clinicians can conduct a process-oriented group in which they address the conflict directly. Alternatively, they can meet individually with the clients who seem to be in conflict to ascertain the reasons for the conflict and to develop some conflict resolution strategies. Or, they can discharge one or more clients from the group.

Strategies for reducing environment-related resistance

Some environmental factors, such as cultural background and socio-economic status, are beyond the control of clients and clinicians. However, their impact on resistance can be minimized. For example, clinicians must endeavour to be culturally sensitive. They can attain this through continuing education efforts and by open communication with clients. Clinicians should ask clients directly about the impact of their cultural background on their beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours and they should take these factors into consideration in treatment planning. With respect to socio-economic status, clinicians should strive to encourage clients about their potential for and ability to change. As with cultural factors, they should take socio-economic status into account in treatment planning.

Resistance due to the setting in which treatment is offered may have to be addressed similarly to cultural and socio-economic factors. That is, in many cases clients and clinicians may not be able to control where treatment is delivered. This is particularly true if treatment is delivered in an institutional setting. Where possible, selecting the best possible location to foster a therapeutic atmosphere within the institutional setting can be helpful. So can reminding clients that, despite the negative atmosphere, they can maintain a positive attitude and change their behaviour for the better. As well, motivational interviewing techniques to encourage clients to see the benefits of treatment may help those involuntary clients who are resistant because they believe they are being forced to take treatment. More indirectly, staff training efforts may have a positive effect on the institutional atmosphere that can then, in turn, have a positive effect on client resistance.

Where clients are resistant due to the negative impact of their social support system, clinicians should use motivational inter-viewing techniques. In doing so, they should lead clients to see the negative impact of their peers on their stated treatment goals. They should also encourage clients to develop potential strategies to minimize negative peer influences. In contrast, telling them that their peers are a bad influence and instructing them to stop associating with their peers will likely be counter-productive.

Strategies for reducing clinician-related resistance

It is incumbent on clinicians to determine their contribution to client resistance and to modify their behaviour accordingly (Mahrer, Murphy, Gagnon, & Gingras, 1994). In addition to accurately assessing client resistance and skillfully employing the strategies above, the following qualities seem essential. Clinicians should be perceptive, sensitive, empathic, friendly, and trust-worthy. They should also be flexible and tolerant. They should demonstrate acceptance of clients, despite their behaviour, good communication skills, and a sense of humour.

Clinicians should also possess the following interpersonal characteristics. They should be supportive of and encouraging to clients, at all times emphasizing client readiness and willingness to make behaviour changes. This is consistent with motivational inter-viewing techniques suggested by Miller and Rollnick (1991). They should use self-disclosure carefully as the utility of clinician self-disclosure depends on the type of therapy, the purpose of the self-disclosure, the particular client, and the amount that is disclosed. Moreover, the relationship between clinician self-disclosure and treatment outcome is unclear.⁴ They should minimize their use of confrontational approaches as these only serve to increase resistance and attrition rates. They also serve to reinforce power dynamics in relationships that may be counter-therapeutic for clients for whom power issues in relationships are a problem. As well, aggressive confrontation exemplifies clinicians taking responsibility for bringing about behaviour change in clients (Jenkins, 1990).

Finally, clinicians should critically evaluate the source of any counter-transference reactions they may have to clients. For example, in the event that they feel anger toward clients, they should try to discern whether or not their anger stems from provocative client behaviours or from their own frustration with recalcitrant clients. After having identified the source of their counter-transference reactions, clinicians must then manage them appropriately otherwise their reactions could serve to increase client resistance. In some cases, it may be necessary to increase their use of supervision or peer support. In others, they may need to refer clients elsewhere.

Strategies for reducing client-clinician relationship resistance

Utilizing strategies suggested in the sections related to both client and clinician resistance should facilitate the reduction of client-clinician resistance, thereby enhancing the therapeutic alliance. Some other strategies are also of note.

Just as ensuring a good match between clients and treatment is important to reduce treatment-related resistance, so too is ensuring a good match between clients and clinicians. This entails consideration of factors such as cultural background and sensitivity, gender, personality, and interpersonal style.

Clinicians should attempt to maintain an empathic and consistently positive attitude towards resistant clients. This is not the same as unconditional positive regard; effective clinicians are able to support and motivate clients and effectively disapprove of certain behaviours. Related to this, clinicians working with any clients, but particularly those considered treatment-resistant, should avoid judging, denigrating, labelling, or otherwise blaming them. Clinicians can encourage them to take responsibility for their behaviour without attributing blame.

Clinicians must establish and maintain clear professional roles and boundaries from the outset. This is distinct from clinicians making a deep personal commitment to clients as is often implied in client-centred therapies.

FORENSIC POPULATIONS AND SETTINGS

Thus far, this chapter has focused on resistance as it applies to non-specific client populations. While many of the issues and suggestions likely apply to forensic populations, some issues are particularly germane while other additional ones must be considered.

Just as resistance was identified as ubiquitous and predictable in all forms of psychotherapy, it is inevitable with forensic populations. Numerous client-related reasons for resistance were identified; forensic clients demonstrate most, if not all of these factors simultaneously and in greater severity than non-forensic clients. That is, the majority of forensic clients are diagnosed with one or more disorders that seriously impair their ability to effectively engage in treatment, demonstrate hostile, defensive, and aggressive personalities, skills deficits, lack of motivation, a number of fears and insecurities, and numerous self-serving behaviours. Moreover, forensic populations tend to be less motivated for treatment, more resistant or non-compliant while in treatment, have higher attrition rates, demonstrate fewer positive behavioural changes while in treatment, and, possibly, demonstrate higher recidivism rates after participating in treatment (Gerstley, McLellan, Alterman, Woody, Luborsky, & Prout, 1989; Ogloff, Wong, & Greenwood, 1990; Rice, Harris, & Cormier, 1992. Many of these characteristics are understandable given that all forensic clients are being involuntarily detained through some legal mechanism and are participating in treatment under some level of duress. As well, forensic settings are typically less than optimal for inducing or maintaining motivation for treatment and behaviour change.

In addition to the strategies suggested for non-specific client populations, clinicians working with forensic populations must take the clients' legal dilemmas into account. For example, forensic clients may appear resistant when they are actually trying to protect themselves from further legal consequences. This occurs when they would like to disclose information in treatment, but fear being charged for additional offences or are instructed not to disclose any information while their offences are under appeal. Clinicians working with forensic populations must also take safety and security factors into account. For example, they must ensure that they meet with clients in locations that are physically safe and they must carefully consider how to deal with potentially aggressive clients. As well, they must make determinations of a clients' risk for violence based upon the resistance, motivation, and treatment gains demonstrated in treatment.

Andrews and Bonta (1994) state that correctional treatment should be delivered to higher risk offenders, target criminogenic needs, be based upon cognitive-behavioural or social learning theories as opposed to non-directive, insight-oriented, or evocative approaches, and take into consideration the principles of risk, need, and responsivity. Relating to the process of treatment, they specify several clinician and therapy variables such as the relationship and contingency principles. The relationship principle posits that a positive therapeutic alliance between clinicians and clients has the potential to facilitate learning. Clinician qualities that contribute to a positive interpersonal relation-ship include being open, enthusiastic, and flexible, attentive and understanding, and demonstrating mutual liking, respect, and caring for offenders. The contingency principle holds that clinicians must, as part of their relationship with clients, set and enforce agreed upon limits to physical and emotional intimacy as well as clear anti-criminal contingencies. The latter includes effective reinforcement for pro-social behaviour and effective disapproval for anti-social behaviour.

This indicates, then, that the development of a therapeutic alliance or a positive interpersonal relationship between clinicians and clients is of primary importance with both non-forensic and forensic populations. This may not be the case, however, for psychopaths.

STRATEGIES FOR REDUCTION OF RESISTANCE WITH PSYCHOPATHS

Although many of the techniques for therapeutic engagement with forensic clients likely apply to psychopaths, perhaps the most resistant of clients, some may be contraindicated (Preston & Murphy, 1997). As noted by several researchers and clinicians, psychopaths possess a unique cluster of personality characteristics (Cleckley, 1982; Hare, 1993; Meloy, 1995). Most notably, they have a diminished capacity to form meaningful interpersonal relationships although they can effectively mimic such a capacity. This suggests that treatments placing heavy emphasis on the development of a therapeutic alliance between clinicians and clients are likely to fail with psychopathic clients. Moreover, such treatments may be risky to clinicians because psychopathic clients lack the empathy required to inhibit their aggressive responses.

Psychopaths typically experience less anxiety and worry than non-psychopaths, a characteristic which mitigates against behaviour change. First, lack of anxiety causes them to be unconcerned about both the effect of their behaviour on others and the effect of incarceration on themselves. Second, lack of anxiety causes them to be less responsive to negative feedback from clinicians.

Psychopaths are also grandiose and tend to relate based on power more than affection. These qualities are sometimes manifested in demands to be dealt with by the most senior avail-able staff. For example, during police investigations they may request to be interviewed by the most senior investigating officer and in treatment they may expect to be treated by the most senior clinician (Hazelwood, 1995). Their grandiosity also means that they may express over-confidence in their skills and abilities, including those they intend to use to reduce their risk to society. Clinicians must not uncritically accept such verbal declarations; they should always look for behavioural evidence that clients have the requisite skills.

In addition to being grandiose, psychopathic clients can be manipulative. This underscores the need for clinicians to be persistent in setting and enforcing limits on their relationships with psychopaths. Clinicians must not protect them from the legal and social consequences of their behaviour (Cleckley, 1982) and they must repeatedly reinforce to them that they will be convinced by actions rather than words when it comes to behaviour change. Manipulativeness also indicates that clinicians must be wary of giving psychopathic clients the benefit of the doubt even in seemingly innocuous situations. This is because psychopaths may perceive clinicians as gullible and therefore legitimate targets for future manipulations if they can be conned in any given situation.

Finally, clinicians who work with psychopathic clients often experience a number of counter-transference reactions such as condemnation of psychopathic clients as untreatable and a wish to destroy or cause harm to seemingly intractible psychopaths. These have been well described by Meloy (1995). Clinicians must be cognizant of their counter-transference reactions in order to deal with them most appropriately.

PERSISTENTLY VIOLENT OFFENDER TREATMENT PROGRAM

The Persistently Violent Offender Treatment Program is a demonstration project developed and funded by the Research Branch of the Correctional Service of Canada. It was a multi-year, multi-site non-residential treatment program currently offered in two medium-security institutions in Canada. The program targeted persistently violent offenders, defined as those having at least three convictions for violent (non-sexual) offences. It was based upon a social problem-solving theoretical frame-work and was delivered according to cognitive-behavioural principles. It involves 16 weeks of half-time participation (Preston, Murphy, Serin, & Bettman, 1999).

Given the population in question, most were treatment-resistant. For this reason, the first section of the program was a motivational module designed to facilitate participant interaction, commitment, and trust. The module began with two weeks of individual therapy as a form of priming. This allowed clients and clinicians a non-threatening opportunity to begin to get to know each other. Clinicians addressed any concerns clients may have had and began to explore clients' goals for the treatment program. At all times, clinicians were respectful, empathic, and supportive. As well, they employed motivational interviewing techniques.

The motivational module also included one week of group sessions. During this week, violence was rarely discussed. Instead, clients and clinicians generated group rules, discussed obstacles to treatment such as on-going substance use, impulsivity, and aggressive beliefs and how to minimize their impact on treatment outcome, and completed a cost-benefit analysis of program completion. In all of these exercises, the short-term and long-term positive and negative impact of various behaviours on clients and others were considered.

The second and third sections of the program were the problem-definition and skills-building modules, respectively. While specific resistance-reducing strategies were not incorporated into these modules as they were in the motivational module, other factors facilitated the reduction of resistance. As already stated, at all times clinicians treated clients with respect and they required clients to act respectfully toward them and others. Clinicians enlisted the group's help in dealing with resistant clients as clients were more likely to internalize their peers' feed-back. On occasion, a peer tutor was hired to serve as a positive role model for resistant clients. As well, clinicians encouraged the use of problem-solving and conflict resolution skills in each group such that clients felt more empowered and took more ownership over how the group progressed.

In terms of client responsivity factors, clients should optimally have attained a grade eight academic level in order to be admitted. However, clients who had not attained this level were been admitted. In such cases, weekly individual sessions allowed an opportunity for clinicians to monitor and assist with progress, the peer tutor provided some assistance, and student volunteers were of considerable utility. Basically, clinicians had license to utilize whatever mechanism best assisted clients to learn group material. Also related to client responsivity is that program content were presented in a simplified fashion, both in group and in homework assignments. Wherever possible, diagrams and analogies were used.

Finally, clinicians selected for the program were screened for personal suitability factors. Preferably, they were competent, confident, sensitive individuals who ascribed to a “firm but fair” approach in dealing with clients. The perception of self-confidence is particularly important with this population as they have a tendency to prey upon staff who appear to be lacking in confidence. They had to have a strong sense of their professional identities and boundaries and be intrinsically motivated. The former helped them to avoid having strong negative counter-transference reactions to clients that could have potentially interfered with their professional judgements while the latter assisted them in maintaining their enthusiasm with this population despite their recalcitrant nature. They also had to work together co-operatively and supportively, to model appropriate behaviours to clients, to reduce potential manipulation by clients, and to sustain each other through inevitable difficulties.

MEASUREMENT OF MOTIVATION IN THE PERSISTENT VIOLENT OFFENDER PROGRAM

Clients who participated in the Persistently Violent Offender treatment program completed a comprehensive assessment battery before and after the treatment program. Self-report measures of responsivity and motivation for treatment were included in the assessment battery (Serin & Kennedy, 1997). Given the lack of correlation between offender self-reports of motivation and behaviour change and outcome, clinicians also completed weekly behavioural ratings of client motivation and behaviour change, as indicated by attendance, participation, behaviour, and attitude. Future analyses will examine the correlation between the two methods of assessment and the relationship of each one to treatment outcome.

CONCLUSION

As was evident from this chapter, given the number of reasons for and forms of treatment resistance, it is impossible to prescribe exactly what to do with any client in any given situation. Careful analysis by clinicians is a prerequisite to employing the most efficacious means to reduce treatment resistance. These efforts are essential given that treatment outcome is contingent upon the reduction of treatment resistance and that the primary anticipated treatment outcome of correctional interventions is the protection of public safety.

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¹ Correctional Service of Canada

² Interested readers are referred to Anderson & Stewart (1983), & Cullari (1996) for comprehensive coverage of resistance and strategies for the reduction of resistance.

³ See Horvath, & Symonds (1991) for a meta-analysis of the relationship between therapeutic alliance and treatment outcome.

⁴ See Chapter 3 of Cullari (1996) for an in-depth consideration of client and clinician self-disclosure.

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REFERENCES

Anderson, C. M., & Stewart, S. (1983). Mastering resistance: A practical guide to family therapy. New York, NY: Guilford Press.

Andrews, D. A., & Bonta, J. (1994). The psychology of criminal conduct. Cincinnati, IL: Anderson Publishing.

Cleckley, H. (1982). The mask of sanity. St. Louis, MI: Mosby Press.

Cullari, S. (1996). Treatment resistance: A guide for practitioners. Massachusetts: Allyn & Bacon.

Ellis, A. (1985). Overcoming resistance. New York, NY: Springer.

Gerstley, L., McLellan, A. T., Alterman, A. I., Woody, G. E., Luborsky, L., & Prout, M. (1989). Ability to form an alliance with the therapist: A possible marker of prognosis for patients with antisocial personality disorder. American Journal of Psychiatry, 146, 508-512.

Goldstein, A. P. (1988). The prepare curriculum: Teaching prosocial competencies. Champaign, IL: Research Press.

Greenson, R. R. (1967). The working alliance and the transference neuroses. Psycholanalysis Quarterly, 34, 155-181.

Hare, R. D. (1993). Without conscience: The disturbing world of the psychopaths among us. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster.

Hazelwood, R. (1995). The sexually violent ofender. Two-day workshop sponsored by Specialized Training Services, Inc., Toronto, ON. October.

Horvath, A. O., & Symonds, B. D.(1991). Relation between working alliance and outcome in psychotherapy: A meta-analysis. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 38, 139-149.

Jenkins, A. (1990). Invitations to responsibility: The therapeutic engagement of men who are violent and abusive. Adelaide, Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications.

Little, G. L., & Robinson, K. D. (1988). Moral reconation therapy: A systematic step-by-step treatment system for treatment resistant clients. Psychological Reports, 62, 135-151.

Mahrer, A. R., Murphy, L., Gagnon, R., & Gingras, N. (1994). The counsellor as a cause and cure of client resistance. Canadian Journal of Counselling, 28, 125-134.

Meloy, J. R. (1995). Treatment of antisocial personality disorder. In G. Gabbard (Ed.), Treatments of psychiatric disorders: The DSM-IV edition, (pp. 2273-2290). Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Press.

Miller, W. R., & Rollnick, S. (1991). Motivational interviewing: Preparing people to change addictive behavior. New York, NY: Guilford Press.

Murphy, C. M., & Baxter, V. A. (1997). Motivating batterers to change in the treatment context. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 12, 607-619.

Ogloff, J. R. P., Wong, S., & Greenwood, A. (1990). Treating criminal psychopaths in a therapeutic community program. Behavioral Sciences and the Law, 8, 181-190.

Preston, D. L., & Murphy, S. (1997). Motivating treatment-resistant clients in therapy. Forum on Corrections Research, 9(2), 39-43.

Preston, D. L., Murphy, S., Serin, R. C., & Bettman, M.(1999). Persistently violent (non-sexual) ofender treatment program: Therapist manual. Ottawa, ON: Correctional Service of Canada.

Prochaska, J. O., DiClemente, C. C., & Norcross, J. C. (1992). In search of the structure of change. In Y. Klar, J. D. Fisher, J. M. Chinsky, & A. Nadler (Eds.), Self-change: Social psychological and clinical perspectives. New York NY: Springer-Verlag.

Rice, M. E., Harris, G. T., & Cormier, C. A. (1992). An evaluation of a maximum-security therapeutic community for psychopaths and other mentally disordered offenders. Law and Human Behavior, 16, 399-412.

Serin, R. C. (1995). Persistently violent (non-sexual) ofenders: A program proposal. Research Report R-42. Ottawa, ON: Correctional Service of Canada.

Serin, R. C., & Kennedy, S. (1997). Treatment readiness and responsivity: Contributing to effective correctional programming. Research Report R-54. Ottawa, ON: Correctional Service of Canada.

 

CHAPTER 9

Education Programming for Offenders

DENNIS J. STEVENS¹

We live in an age of globalization, restructuring, and rapid technological change. As a result, institutions such as government, corporations, and institutions of higher learning are adapting new roles, new responsibilities, and new relationships (Wilson, 1992). How do civilized and just nations expect to maintain prosperity and safety if many of its illiterate and poor are frequently under correctional control?

There is often concern about correctional populations, yet correctional outcomes are often overlooked. Compelling evidence is offered which shows that controlling crime through education may be an effective and economical method of reducing recidivism rates. Phrased differently, education may be one means of improving reintegration potential of offenders. This chapter examines education as one method of preparing an offender to step back into his or her community with a renewed sense of self image, pride through the accomplishment, and a plan to stay clear from one of the simulators of criminal activity -- unemployment. The argument will be made that one of the least expensive yet most effective methods of crime control (reducing recidivism) is through the education of offenders.

CONTEXT

A one-day snapshot of prisoners in Canada's correctional facilities shows that at midnight on October 5, 1996 there were 23,679 prisoners in Provincial and territorial prisons and 13,862 in Federal prisons or a total of 37,541 prisoners (Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics [CCJS], 1999a). Prisoners in Provincial custody serve an average of 31 days and federal custody prisoners serve an average of 44 months (Boe, Motiuk, & Muirhead, 1998). In 1995-96, 114,562 offenders passed through Provincial and territorial prisons and 4,402 offenders passed through federal institutions (CCJS, 1999b). Thus, a high percentage of the Canadian population is exposed to the criminal justice system or more specifically, 151 per 100,000 of the adult population. Canada has one of the highest rates of incarceration in the developed world, second to the United States. This represents an unusual opportunity to help educate a population who otherwise may not see education as a positive experience.

Offenders admitted into the custody of the Correctional Service of Canada typically rank among Canada's most poorly educated citizens. Nearly two out of three offenders (64%) have not completed their high school diploma, of which 30% have not even completed Grade 8. In 1993/1994, 70% of newly admitted offenders tested below the Grade-8 literacy equivalency while more than four in five new inmates (86%) scored below Grade 10 (Boe, 1998). Similarly, research indicates that in the United States prison system, 19% of adult prisoners are completely illiterate, and 40% are functionally illiterate, which means they would be unable to write a letter explaining a billing error (Center on Crime, Communities & Culture, 1998).

The reality of recidivism rates within the Canadian penal system requires attention. Overall, about one half of male offenders released from Canadian federal institutions recidivate. Also, about two thirds of the Aboriginal offenders and roughly one third of women offenders are returned to prison. Recidivists tend to be younger at the time of their first adult conviction, have more extensive criminal histories and are single.

The public, although decidedly punitive toward lawbreakers, are more lenient toward inmates because the public believes, those offenders are no longer an immediate threat. That is, there is an expectation that punishment will teach an offender a lesson. Therefore, it could be reasonable to argue that reduced recidivism rates, from the public's perspective, is the responsibility of the community where former inmates are released, as opposed to the prison system an offender was released from (Allen & Simonsen, 1998). Nonetheless, returning unprepared, uneducated, and unusually bitter individuals to the community could represent a further threat to public safety and enhance recidivism rates (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1997; Stevens, 1 997a; 1 997b; 1994). The more offenders are isolated from a law abiding society and deprived of society's amenities or opportunities, the more likely it is that they will reject the lifestyles and laws of that society (Glaser, 1975; 1997; Stevens, 1998a: 1998b; Stevens & Ward, 1997). One method of bringing individuals into society's embrace is through education especially a liberal arts education since it can provide a better understanding of society along with its expectations as its rewards.

EDUCATION PROGRAMS

Currently, educational and vocational programs are available at most correctional institutions in Canada. Educational programs consist of Adult Basic Education -- (Grade 1 to 10), Secondary Education, Vocational, College, and University level programs. Inmates generally pay for their own post-secondary education, unless it can be demonstrated that the education addresses a specific criminogenic need. Each program component provides offenders with opportunities to acquire education commensurate with need, achievement and ability. Through vocational programs such as plumbing, welding and small engines repair, inmates are provided with job related skills training relevant to employment opportunities available in the institutions and in the communities.

In all correctional programs, offenders interact in group settings that provide them with opportunities to learn and practice skills that might be required in work settings in the private sector. Examples of these skills are: problem solving, critical thinking, punctuality, interacting with others, being respectful of other people's opinions and feelings, and dealing with authority figures.

CORCAN is one of the most recognized programs. Through its five business lines: Agribusiness, Construction, Manufacturing, Services and Textiles, CORCAN provides offenders with work experiences and training which replicates private sector work environments as closely as possible. CORCAN programs are in place in 32 institutions across Canada, creating the equivalent of 2,000 full time trainee positions. Offenders receive training in the manufacture and provision of a wide range of products and services such as office furniture, clothing, shelving, agricultural products, metal fabrication, data entry, digital imaging and telemarketing. CORCAN products are marketed to the public sector: governments, non-profit organizations, and educational and health care institutions. CORCAN also offers community based short-term employment, job counselling, and placement programs.

Although vocational training is vital, this chapter will focus on academic education at the secondary and post secondary level or college. It should be clear that every offender responds favourably to vocational training or its opportunities.

Canada is extremely successful in conducting vocational training programs, however, I believe that men and women inmates who earn a college degree while under correctional supervision tend to lead law abiding lives more often than offenders who have not earned a college degree. That is, some may want to deal more efficiently with themselves, their families, and their community by embracing those values, skills, and knowledge that might help an individual make well-informed decisions. Once we're past the realities that not all offenders are educable, desire further education, and/or will never complete a college degree, it might be safe to assume that some, although fewer than expected, will advance themselves through education. Yet, it is argued that offender characteristics are stronger predictors of recidivism rates than the correctional mission or organisational affect itself (Clarke & Harrison, 1992). Some scholars question the efficacy of prison treatment programs casting doubts on studies showing positive outcomes of a college education for inmates (Andrews et al., 1990; Cullen & Gilbert 1988; Logan & Gaes, 1992).

The mission of correctional education

Some say that the primary purpose of education is learning and academic progress (Langenbach, North, Aagaard, & Chown, 1990; Lawrence, 1994). However, the philosophy of correctional education should also reflect the characteristics of the correctional environment and its students, especially since correctional settings are a closed and an abnormal environment (Reagen & Stoughton, 1976). The role of correctional education is to:

• function as an agent of change for both the prisoner and the system;
• maintain its integrity in terms of its basic commitment to freedom of inquiry; and
• study, evaluate, and respond to all variables in the individual, the system, and society that are to be benefited by the educational concerns with process, product, and social reform (Reagen & Stoughton, 1976, p. 15).

The role of correctional academic education could:

• relieve boredom of dead-head prison time;
• give student-inmates a better understanding of society;
• give non custody professionals an opportunity to monitor correctional operations;
• keep offenders busy with positive pursuits;
• give inmates an opportunity to experience values of a law abiding individual (teachers); and
• alter behaviour preventing costly reincarceration.

THE CONTROVERSY

Is there a fundamental and unresolvable antagonism between the keeper and the kept? Yet, many inmates want to improve their lot and if given a change, will do so as evidenced by many offenders who never return to prison, once released (Lowman & MacLean, 1995; Statistics Canada, 1994). Does correctional education reduce recidivism rates? Most of the evidence appears to be inclusive (Linden & Perry, 1982; Morrison, 1993). However, some researchers argue that there is no conclusive evidence correlating correction education to reduced recidivism while others go further and suggest that little can alter criminally violent behaviour (Cary, 1993; Cullen & Gilbert, 1988; Fogel, 1976; Palmer, 1991; Samenow, 1984). For example, Martinson (1974) argues that with few and isolated exceptions, rehabilitation efforts of advanced education that have been reported so far (1947-1967) have had no appreciable effect on reduced recidivism. Martinson's influence in corrections has frequently been associated with the shift from a treatment/rehabilitation orientation in corrections to a just deserts/justice orientation.

Opponents to correctional education argue that criminal tendencies learned on the outside cannot be “unlearned” on the inside, and, they add, offenders gave up their rights to amenities such as education when they took away the rights of others (Reagen & Stoughton, 1976).

Can we accept that offenders do have an after-life from correctional environments, and discount the idea that when they are confined they accept the inmate code, as argued by Caron (1978)? This code is, presumably, a guidebook on how to succeed in prison by not really trying to reform. In the face of such controversy, some researchers say that whatever categories the correctional administrators place a newcomer in, it will not mean very much, as a prisoner's true standing comes from fellow inmates (Lowman & MacLean, 1995). Perhaps there is some confusion with these thoughts as they relate to Clemmer's (1958) prisonization effect. The term prisonization refers to the longer inmates are incarcerated, the stronger their identification with inmate norms and values, and the more difficulty they would have adjusting to life once released. True, Clemmer suggests that inmates, like other social groups, have a culture which he defined as a mode of life or thought that is not peculiarly individual but which can be characterized as a shared set of attitudes that can eventually impact behavioural patterns and lifestyles. Part of this process includes learning enough of the culture to make individual characteristics of the environment -- an environment that produces a deprivation of liberty, a loss of worldly possessions, a denied access to heterosexual relationships, a divestment of autonomy, and being compelled to associate with other criminals or what Sykes (1966) refers to as the “pains of imprisonment”.

But neither Clemmer's perspective nor my studies examined prisonisation effects on student-prisoners. I am of the opinion that a student-prisoner learns a different set of values and norms than a typical prisoner.

EDUCATION AND RECIDIVISM

On the other side of the controversy, researchers who examined the relationship between correctional education and recidivism levels abstracted a total of 97 articles published between 1969 and 1993. The results reveal “solid support for a positive relationship between correctional education and [lower] recidivism.” In the 97 articles, 83 (85%) reported documented evidence of recidivism control through correctional education, while only 14 (15%) reported a negative relationship between correctional education and reduced recidivism. The following statement of McCormick (1999) sheds some enlightment on what some inmates think about education:

“We resent the walls, bars, uniforms, being told what to do, what programs we must take. None of us arrived by accident and if we are honest with ourselves, we'll acknowledge a whole series of destructive behaviours that preceded our committal to a monastery of the damned. In view of status and our chances of success upon release, the future doesn't look particularly bright. But until we come to terms with our individual reality -- separate the crime from the man, decide that the “I am” is capable of much more than what the label implies -- we're doomed to failure. Administration uses statistics to create the illusion of massive reform. But it's up to us to demand delivery. Enrol in courses. Ask for help from each other. Educated cons have reason to lift their heads. Whether the “man” wants to acknowledge it or not, educated prisoners get respect from everybody inside and outside the prison, and that's the one thing that can't be taken away from us at the gate.”

Additionally, one study examined the recidivism data of 60 released inmates for a 3-year period in the United States (Stevens & Ward, 1997). Nonetheless, each participant had earned an associate and/or a bachelor's degrees while incarcerated in a high custody North Carolina prison. When the data were pooled with data from other states, it appeared that earning a degree while incarcerated significantly reduced recidivism rates for both men and women offenders. Specifically, of the 60 North Carolina released inmates, 5% (3, all men with associate's degrees) were returned to prison for criminally violent offences in the 36 months following their release. Women and men offenders who earned four-year degrees were not reincarcerated during the three-year period after their release, and, all but one of these individuals found employment relating to their degree. Also, the income of the degree-earning students was greater than their income prior to incarceration if employed, but most of them were unemployed at the time of their arrest and subsequent conviction. These findings are congruent with a study that shows individuals who received higher education while incarcerated have a significantly better rate of employment (60–75%) than those who do not participate in college programs (40%) (Center on Crime, Communities & Culture, 1998).

Continuing along this line of reasoning, approximately 40% of the general prison population in North Carolina were reincarcerated within three years of their release (NCDOC, 1995). In this case, if the degree-earning individuals were typical of the general prisoner population of North Carolina, 24 former inmates (40% X 60) would have been re-confined instead of 3. The difference of 21 inmates saved North Carolina taxpayers $612,893 for the first year of their re-incarceration and each year thereafter. Canadian incarceration costs are much higher than North Carolina's cost. Reprocessing costs and the costs of their crimes are not available to include in the above the savings. Equally important, however, is that the prison population in North Carolina is similar to the Canadian prisoner population in both federal and Providential prisons, but, the release rate in Canada is 10 times that of North Carolina. Theoretically, if the 60 were 600 (at 40%=240), and the savings were 11 million dollars instead of $612,893 then Canada stands to gain financially in this area of social control. And don't forget the differences in daily cost of inmates and the prosecution costs, which would probably put the yearly savings over 16 mil-lion dollars annually. Doubled the second year. Additionally, the above study focused on those offenders who finished a college education in one region of the state. It did not examine prisoners who were involved in the educational process but did not earn a degree.

The average confinement time served in Canada is far different than in North Carolina. Can Canada educate its educable prisoner population in 44 months or less? In a word, yes, if Canadian policy makers reflect on “a core of new thinking” about education. First, however, offenders who do not have a secondary school education or its equivalent should be required to finish once they are under correctional supervision. It should be a requirement of their release. Correctionally supervised individuals who completed secondary school should have the opportunity at federal and Provincial expense to pursue a college program leading to a college degree. Masters programs and Ph.D. programs should be made available but at the expense of the individual. Those programs can be best accomplished through telecommunication. In summary, it is less expense to educate than incarcerate. Following are some “idealized” points to consider.

A CORE OF NEW THINKING

How many educational organizations will become obsolete? Certainly, many educational leaders have the courage to realize that non-traditional academic roles of that of a visionary and an agent of moral change is what is required of them if their organization desires continued success. A visionary might see that student demo-graphics and future student employment demands have changed, and as a moral agent of change a visionary leader might see that the role education plays in student advancement has changed, too.

CENTRALIZED DIVISION OR UNIT

The next step is to establish a centralized division or unit -- under the direction of a single educational director at the federal level and single educational directors at each Provincial level working in a collaborative governance of the educational enterprise. That is, it operates under a federal structure in which individual unit work co-operatively to achieve organizational goals, which include competency. This education correctional service administers, supervises, and operates both a secondary and university programs and reports directly to the commissioner of Correctional Service of Canada. Accreditation can be accomplished through one of the many educational institutions already established in Canada or it can create its own entity and apply for accreditation.

CURRICULUM

The collaborative governance of the enterprise should develop both secondary and undergraduate programs that facilitate completion at a faster pace and with greater curriculum consistency than traditional programs. These programs should include the policy that students enrol in a program as opposed to signing up for classes, depending on the student's academic level. Each program has sequenced modules (classes) structured in a logical progression to ensure that educational objectives can be met. Module sequences are not negotiable unless a student requires retaking a specific module. There could be four separate programs developed -- one at the secondary level, and three at the college (undergraduate) level. The secondary level program consists of required core courses as outlined by most secondary institutions. One of the three college programs is provided to accommodate general educational core requirements of a typical university, and two college programs take over after the general educational core courses are met (either through the general education requirement program or from other qualified educational sources). Of the two, one is a program leading to a baccalaureate degree with a major in behavioural science and the other program leads to a baccalaureate degree in business. More degree programs would make matters more complex. Classroom structure, formats, and grades (competency) should be consistent which will allow for easy movement from one program to another, and from one location (inside or outside of prison) to another.

CLASS TIME

The relationship between educational seat-time and gaining knowledge is a worrisome perspective. Many traditional students sit in classrooms for an entire semester and have difficulty in articulating or understanding the principles of a course. In a traditional college course, students are expected to sit in a classroom for approximately 45 hours a semester. For some reason, that amount of time has been designated as appropriate. However, many college educational programs have cut seat time primarily because student demographics and priorities have changed. Drawing on those strengths, a teacher can expect students to participate at an entire different level than traditional students and additional workload for the student will far make up the difference in seat time. For example, at one institution where I developed and operated a similar program as the one described, students sat in class for four hours, once a week, for five weeks to complete a three 3-semester hour (module), and after 12 modules received a baccalaureate degree (assuming the student qualified to enter the program). Student output in these programs were similar or greater than student output in traditional programs preserving classroom integrity.

ENCOURAGING EDUCATION

One method to encourage education in the penitentiary is to have part (or all) of the educational process delivered inside prison and part (or all) of the educational process delivered outside of prison, thus program consistency is equally important. A student can take the same module or program at many locations throughout Canada. All individuals under correctional super-vision including those on parole can attend these educational programs thereby enhancing solidarity among students that will also aid in their completing the program. The advantages of having offenders engaged in an educational pursuit is that correctional supervision is shared through teachers and other students while meeting educational objectives and ultimately reducing recidivism levels.

DIFFERENT MEASURES OF COMPETENCY

The term “competency” no longer should suggest that a student have the capacity to do a job; consequently, educators and business leaders should stop measuring competency with learning outcome approaches. Grades are sometimes ambiguous indicators of performance. Students move into the next module by accomplishing the objectives of the last module. Most of those objectives have to do with application. Thus, gaining a competency in a certain module means that the student has met the objectives of the module. Rutherford (1998) somewhat agrees with this perspective and offers a modern definition for “competency” while providing a model for developing competency standards in educational institutions and businesses. Such standards teach students/workers not only job skills, but also how to apply, and adjust those skills in specific environments. Great and safe nations require a more competent law abiding work force, and one method of producing it is to educate those individuals within that nation who can utilize an education most.

METHODS OF DELIVERY

Modules should include different methods of educational delivery in classrooms conducted by qualified educators, merged with a delivery system via computers, distance learning methods, and/or telecommunication programs. Distant learning methods work well but require full time qualified educators to be part of that system. In fact, those instructors should be the primary focus of the system. However, technology teaching must be part of the curriculum so students can compete for challenging jobs.

Yet, educational endeavours, for example, are caught up in technology, and think they need new ways of organizing teaching and learning (Ehrmann, 1995). Because some educators are pleased when lecturing as they witness the eyes of their students light up and respond as though they understand the material. The styles of delivery by some educators border the edge of a Hollywood production. An assumption, made by an awesome professor is that once a student hears the truth, prior beliefs will be irrelevant. The student may even get an A for the course. Yet, if we probe, we might discover that the original belief is still present and virtually untouched, says Ehrmann. In some cases students are further confused by the lecture. That's because they had used their hidden preconceptions to (mis)interpret what the teacher was saying. The students were never forced to become conscious of their prior beliefs, let alone to test them against new ideas. When educating adults, the problem is greater.

The result is what an artist might call “pentimento,” a layer of “learning” is painted over a pre-existing belief, but, after a time, the original belief about the content re-emerges, mostly untouched, argues Ehrmann. It's a style of teaching by broadcast, even though students are in the same classroom or watching telecommunication monitors. That's because the information flow is almost entirely from the faculty member outward to the students. Little fresh information flows from the students to the faculty member (or to each other). This kind of broadcast instruction may happen several times before ultimate graduation. And (surprise!) after that graduation it turns out that the graduate still does not understand (Ehrmann, 1995). It is eventually realized that broadcast teaching can be inefficient, even ineffectual, because instructors currently don't discover what each of their students already thinks.

Adult students have their own experiences and understanding of the social world, and their point of view may be right -- for them. That is, adult learners require help in understanding their own realities and theories about those realities. Central to this process of learning is critical reflection and testing new meanings through deliberate reflection on the evidence, on arguments based upon alternative points of view, and on critically examining assumptions (Mezirow, 1991). Faculty members should ask more probing questions in class (whether the students are in the same room or a hundred miles away). They should devise assignments that help students confront their beliefs and test their skills. Overall, I am suggesting that educational endeavours should become student-centred starting with the knowledge of the student in order to advance the adult learner. This is a method of teaching I call collaborative learning.

COMPUTERS

This core of new teaching goes beyond educational delivery strategies. A new study on the impact of computers on mathematics learning shows positive results. The study, involving almost 1,200 secondary students in British Columbia and Alberta, found that students using computer courseware achieved higher test scores and levels of comprehension than ‘control' students using traditional approaches. The test group used The Learning Equation Mathematics (TLE), computer courseware developed by ITP Nelson in co-operation with participating Ministries of Education. Learning outcomes were measured on Alberta's provincial grade nine achievement test, based on the common western mathematics curriculum (Computers and Learning, 1999). The results among adult learners should be greater.

Keltner and Ross (1995) argue that computer and information technology is taking on increasing importance in the work-place and in society, and that educators and policymakers are redoubling their efforts to bring technology into the classroom. Furthermore, computer technology does not necessarily suggest Internet access. CD ROM databases and computer programs do not require accesses to the Web to be instructional.

However, the point is that if grade school children are better prepared for a transition from an industrial to an information age, then individuals who can not compete with school children will fail more often.

ASSESSMENT

As educational programs get underway, assessment methods should be in place to determine the effectiveness of those programs. That is, the utility of non-traditional forms of assessment is an important issue. This thought is consistent with Stecher, Rahn, Ruby, Alt, and Robyn (1997) who argue that recent changes in assessment practices may hold great promise for educators especially vocational educators. The authors suggest a focus of program definition, implementation, and administration; the quality and feasibility of the assessment; and the potential usefulness of the assessment approach for educators. My own experience suggests that non-traditional method of assessment for adult educators and learners are more accurate.

CONCLUSIONS

As appealing as getting “tough on criminals” may sound, civilizations historically have utilized every method imagined to control criminal activity, and yet crime continues to flourish. One assumption a civilized society can make is that the severity of punishment has not always guaranteed the results sought: justice and efficient crime reduction, argues Glaser (1997). Canadians have taken the initiative of critically examining and, eventually eliminating capital punishment in response to their findings that death might not be an answer to control crime in a moral nation. In Canada's quest for justice and control crime, change is pervasive, and education is an efficient agent for societal change. Offering individuals under correctional supervision a student-centred advanced educational program provides an avenue for those offenders who want change, an opportunity to advance themselves and ultimately the community. An educated population can protect a just and safe community from terrorism that might surface from both inside and outside its borders. Education is the new millennium's power and currency, and the wealth of a nation must be distributed to more of its population. It is time that policy makers commit to combating crime by helping violators help themselves. Barth (1990) argues, and rightfully so, that each educational enterprise faces the task of constructing an effective educational and intellectual community around a unique set of issues and individuals. To this end, educating offenders to become productive members of society without compromising custody in a short period of time may seem like an impossible task, yet, consider the alternatives.

Traditional notions may have been successful for traditional students, but might produce failure for adult students. This thought is congruent with Boyett and Boyett (1998) who argue that educational organizations must foster “communities of practice” (informal networks in which students and teachers exchange ideas and experiences). A visionary might see that the relation-ship between the educational organization and the student has changed. For instance, the role of educator has changed from lecturer to facilitator. As a moral agent of change knowledge and its priorities are different. For instance, the educational process should become student-centred by beginning with what the student knows as opposed to beginning with what the organization knows. Pedagogy and curriculum should emphasise application, and theoretical concepts might become guideposts as opposed to the other way around.

There are no utopia educational systems. Rather, the way to improve schools is through “preserving what is valuable and reworking what is not,” suggests school reform writers like Tyack and Cuban (1995). In this way, progress is measured by whether the definite problem at hand has been resolved or lessened. Effective reform begins with a well-defined problem to address, and remains flexible to the circumstances of the situation it is applied to.

An interesting guide about educational reform comes from Tyack and Cuban who suggest the following:

• No master plans for the fixing of all problems will be accepted. We cannot leap into a perfect educational system, but must work to make things better bit by bit.
• Involve teachers, parents, and administrators in the process of reform (especially teachers) and make sure that the “answers” are to questions that are being asked by those involved.
• Move in small steps.

Tinker! I think a colleague, Paul Friday, summed it best with his thought that there is no better way to gain knowledge than from the experiences of others nor a more effective way to achieve our own altruistic goals than through the information we, as educators, transmit to the leaders of tomorrow!

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¹ University of Massachusetts, College of Public and Community Services

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REFERENCES

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Barth, R. (1990). Improving schools from within. San Francisco, CA: Jossey Bass.

Boe, R. (1998). A two-year follow-up of federal offenders who participated in the Adult Basic Education (ABE) Program. Research Report R-60. Ottawa, ON: Correctional Service of Canada.

Boe, R., Motiuk, L. L., & Muirhead, M. (1998). Recent statistical trends shaping the corrections population in Canada. Forum on Corrections Research, 10(1), 3-7.

Boyett, J. H., & Boyett, J. T. (1998). Leading a knowledge organization: Three keys to success. On The Horizon: The Strategic Planning Resource for Education Professionals.

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Cary, M. K. (1993). How states can fight violent crime. Two dozen steps. Center on Crime, Communities and Culture.(1998).

Clarke, S., & Harrison, A. L. (1992). Recidivism of criminal offenders assigned to community correctional programs or released from prison in North Carolina in 1989. Report prepared for the North Carolina Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission. Institute of Government. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina.

Clemmer, D. (1958). The prison community. New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.

Computers and Learning (1999). Society for the Advancement of Excellence in Education.

Cullen, F. T., & Gilbert, K. E. (1988). Reaffirming rehabilitation. Cincinnati, OH: Anderson.

Ehrmann, S. C. (1995). The bad option and the good option. The Educom Review, 30(5), 41-43.

Fogel, D. (1976). ... We are the living proof... The justice model for corrections. Cincinnati, OH: Anderson.

Glaser, D. (1975). Strategic criminal justice planning. Rockville, MA: National Institute of Mental Health.

Glaser, D. (1997). Profitable penalties: How to cut both crime rates and costs. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.

Keltner, B., & Ross, R. L. (1995). The cost of school-based educational technology, Programs. RAND.

Langenbach, M., North, M., Aagaard, L., & Chown, W. (1990). Televised instruction in Oklahoma prisons: A study of recidivism and disciplinary actions. Journal of Correctional Education, 41(2), 87-94.

Lawrence, D. (1994). Inmates students: Where do they fit in? Journal of the Oklahoma Criminal Justice Research Consortium, 1, 55-63.

Linden, R., & Perry, L. (1982). The effectiveness of prison education programs. Journal of Counseling, Services, and Rehabilitation, 6(4), 43-57.

Logan, C., & Gaes, G. (1992). Meta-analysis and the rehabilitation of punishment. Justice Quarterly, 10, 245-263.

Lowman, J., & MacLean, B. (1995). Prisons and protest in Canada. In E. Sbarbaro & R. Keller (Eds.), Prison crisis: Critical readings (pp.180-199). Albany, NY: Harrow and Heston, Publishers.

Martison, R. (1 974). What Works? Questions and answers about prison reform. The Public Interest, (Spring), 22-50.

McCormick, J. E. (1999). Personal communication.

Mezirow, J. (1991). Faded visions and fresh commitments: Adult education's social goals. A policy paper prepared for the AAACE (November 11).

Morrison, K. P. (1993). Reading, writing, and recidivism. CEA News and Notes, 15(2), 11 and 18.

North Carolina Department of Corrections (NCDOC). (1995). Report on inmate incarceration cost per day for the year ended June 30, 1995. Raleigh, NC.

Palmer, T. (1991). The effectiveness of intervention: Recent trends and cur-rent issues. Crime and Delinquency, 37, 330-346.

Reagen, M. V., & Stoughton, D. M. (1976). School behind bars: A descriptive overview of correctional education in the American prison system. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.

Rutherford, P. (1998). Competency-Based training: The link between education and workplace excellence. On The Horizon: The Strategic Planning Resource for Education Professionals.

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Stevens, D. J. (1997a). Violence begets violence. Corrections Compendium: The National Journal for Corrections. American Correctional Association, 22(12), 1-2.

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Stevens, D. J. (1997c). Origins of prison gangs in North Carolina. Journal of Gang Research, 4(4), 23-35.

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Stevens, D. J. (1994). The depth of imprisonment and prisonisation: Levels of security and prisoners' anticipation of future violence. The Howard Journal of Criminal Justice 33(2), 137-157.

Sykes, G. M. (1966). Society of captives. New York, NY: Princeton University Press.

Tyack, D., & Cuban, L. (1995). Tinkering toward utopia: A century of public school reform. Harvard, MS: Harvard University Press.

Wilson, I. (1992). A new social charter for higher education? On the Horizon, 1(2), 1-3.

 

CHAPTER 10

Offender Employment Programming

CHRISTA A. GILLIS¹

Offender employment has played a pivotal role in corrections since the introduction of institutions (Funke, Wayson, & Miller, 1982; Gaes, Flanagan, Motiuk, & Stewart, 1999; Guynes & Greiser, 1986; Miller & Greiser, 1986; Townsend, 1996), although the purpose of employment has changed with prevailing correctional ideologies. Even though employment is an important rehabilitative tool, little is known about the factors and processes that contribute to employment stability among offenders (Gillis, 1998; Ryan, 1998), as few systematic empirical studies have been conducted in this area (Gaes et al., 1999; Pearson & Lipton, 1999; Ryan, 1998). Recent meta-analyses provide empirical verification of employment as a moderate risk factor for recidivism among offenders (Gendreau, Little, & Goggin, 1996; Gendreau, Goggin, & Gray, 1998). This finding reiterates the importance of enhancing our understanding of the employment construct in order to provide effective assessment and to assist in the reduction of this need through appropriately directed intervention strategies.

This chapter describes current employment measurement techniques and proposes modified measurement strategies. Research findings regarding program effectiveness are then applied to the exploration of employment as a correctional intervention aimed at increasing the likelihood of successful community reintegration among offenders. It also introduces a conceptual framework for the systematic exploration of community employment stability, and its impact on offender reintegration; and provides recommendations regarding directions for future employment research and interventions with offenders.

ASSESSMENT OF EMPLOYMENT NEEDS

Employment is a prevalent need among incarcerated Canadian offenders, with approximately 75% of offenders (76% of men, and 74% women) identified with employment needs at the time of entry to a federal institution (Motiuk, 1997). Moreover, offenders have indicated that they perceive employment deficits as contributing to their criminal behaviour (Erez, 1987).

Empirical support substantiating the link between offender employment deficits and recidivism was provided in a meta-analytic review of the literature by Gendreau et al. (1996). In their quantitative review, Gendreau and colleagues identified unstable education and employment (subsumed within the broader “social achievement” domain) as a contributing factor to recidivism among offenders (r = 0.15). An expansion of the meta-analysis was con-ducted as part of a larger review of the Correctional Service of Canada Dynamic Factors Identification and Analysis (DFIA) protocol, from the Offender Intake Assessment (OIA) process (see Gendreau et al., 1998). The OIA process, used to evaluate offenders' criminogenic needs upon entry to federal correctional institutions, incorporates employment as one of the seven major offender need areas in the DFIA (Motiuk, 1997; Taylor, 1997). In their meta-analysis Gendreau et al. reported education/ employment (r = 0.26), employment needs at discharge (r = 0.15), and employment history (r = 0.14) as some of the most powerful predictors of recidivism within the employment domain. The average correlation with recidivism of the 200 effect sizes from 67 studies was r = 0.13.

Although employment deficits are firmly entrenched as a moderate predictor of recidivism, the impact on recidivism may be underestimated due to oversimplified definition and measurement of the construct. Employment risk factors have traditionally been assessed in a dichotomous manner (i.e., presence/absence of employment deficits), thereby potentially reducing their predictive ability. In addition, many items are historical in nature, limiting the utility of this information for directing current interventions.

The employment domain in the DFIA is more comprehensive in its assessment of static and dynamic employment risk factors. It is therefore useful not only in predicting an individual's risk for recidivism, but also for guiding the level of employment intervention required to decrease an individual's risk level in accordance with the risk principle. Moreover, items from the DFIA employment domain may be used to suggest specific areas requiring attention, consistent with the need principle.²

The advent of dynamic risk assessment tools such as the DFIA has contributed not only to our ability to more effectively appraise offender needs and competencies, but also to our ability to track change in employment needs as a function of treatment participation. Nonetheless, there is a need to progress toward improved dynamic assessment of competencies, attitudes, values, beliefs and satisfaction with employment, as proposed by Gendreau and colleagues (1998). Gendreau advocated the enhancement of dynamic assessment within the DFIA, using a compilation of scales such as those proposed in Gillis (1998). In accordance with the principles of effective classification (Andrews, Bonta et al., 1990; Andrews & Bonta, 1998), dynamic assessment would contribute to better understanding of an offender's criminogenic needs and employment competencies and strengths, consequently increasing the potential to prioritize offender employment needs and to guide effective intervention strategies. Furthermore, a dynamic assessment strategy in relation to offender employment needs would allow for reassessment to track change in employment needs as a function of training. An amalgamation of static and dynamic risk and needs assessment protocols would most effectively appraise competencies that potentially contribute to safe reintegration, in addition to evaluating factors that place the individual at risk for future involvement in crime. Such an approach is consistent with Correctional Service of Canada's Correctional Strategy, which advocates prioritizing offender criminogenic needs and providing correctional intervention on the basis of effective needs identification.

EMPLOYMENT AS TREATMENT

Just as employment assessment has often been conducted using a dichotomous approach to the identification of employment needs (i.e., absence/presence of needs), program evaluations have typically used an approach that likewise limits the utility of the information provided. Numerous researchers attempting to review the employment literature have noted these methodological weaknesses (Gaes et al., 1999; Gerber & Fritsch, 1995; Pearson & Lipton, 1999; Ryan, 1998). For instance, many evaluations of employment intervention strategies have defined the independent variable in a dichotomous manner (i.e., participated/did not participate in employment program). Such an approach precludes examination of integral factors such as selection bias, quality of participation, length of time in the program, and reasons for attrition. Additionally, many pro-gram evaluations fail to report important information pertaining to offender employment needs and competencies prior to program participation. Moreover, the issue of comorbidity in offender needs, such as the combination of employment and substance abuse needs, is important to consider for its potential impact on work performance and treatment gain. Ryan summarized many of the methodological flaws that inhibit our ability to formulate conclusive evidence on the impact of offender employment training, including: “problems in research methodology and program development, including comparability of experimental and control groups, selection of participants, tracking of ex-offenders, differentiation between structural and subcultural variables, and definition of job retention” (Ryan, 1998, Executive Summary, p. E5). A comprehensive evaluation of employment program effectiveness must thus consider a variety of factors that may moderate the impact of the program on the criterion of interest (e.g., job attainment and retention, successful community performance).

In assessing the impact of employment training on offenders, one must be cognizant of the aforementioned limitations. To date, findings have been equivocal, with some studies reporting positive effects of employment on recidivism, and others reporting limited or no effects (Gaes et al., 1999; Gerber & Fritsch, 1995; Pearson & Lipton, 1999; Ryan, 1998). Some reviewers, based on a qualitative analysis of the literature, have adopted a fairly optimistic out-look on the impact of employment training on recidivism (e.g., Braithwaite, 1980; Gerber & Fritsch, 1995). Pearson and Lipton aptly summarized the state of the employment literature, based on results from their meta-analytic review of educational and vocational programs: “Although some types of educational and vocational programs appear promising in terms of reducing recidivism, due to a lack of studies using high-quality research methods we are unable to conclude that they have been verified effective in reducing recidivism” (Abstract, italics in original). This paucity of systematic research in the realm of offender employment can be contrasted with the extensive knowledge base derived from exploration of the overall treatment effectiveness literature.

Over time, researchers have observed particular practices that differentiate effective from ineffective programs, and these have been confirmed and replicated using meta-analytic techniques (Gendreau, 1996; Gendreau & Andrews, 1990; Gendreau et al., 1996). Meta-analyses of the treatment literature provide quantitative information at the aggregate level regarding the impact of programs on recidivism, thereby bypassing many of the problems associated with the qualitative interpretation of single studies (Andrews & Bonta, 1998; Gendreau et al., 1996). The two most comprehensive meta-analytic reviews of the treatment literature to date (McGuire & Priestly, 1995), conducted by Lipsey (1990) and Andrews, Zinger and colleagues (1990), substantiate the numerous principles of effective intervention elucidated by correctional theorists and researchers.

Lipsey analyzed the relationship between treatment and recidivism in 443 studies of juvenile offending and found support for the effectiveness of intervention in 64% of the treatment versus comparison studies. Whereas juveniles in the comparison conditions, on average, evidenced a recidivism rate of 50%, offenders in the treatment conditions recidivated at an average rate of 45%. Although this represents a 10% reduction in recidivism in favour of treatment conditions, Lipsey further corrected for the unreliability associated with official records of offending, and postulated that treatment effects were more likely in the range of 20% (from 50% recidivism to 40%).

Lipsey extended the analysis to explore factors associated with treatment effects, including type of study and type of treatment. After controlling statistically for various methodological factors (e.g., small sample size, attrition, etc.), he found that type of treatment contributed significantly to effect size estimates. He found that recidivism was reduced most substantively under treatment conditions that: lasted longer (and had more meaningful contact with offenders); were provided external to correctional settings and institutions; were under the influence of the evaluator; were behaviour-oriented, skill-oriented and multimodal; were provided to higher-risk cases; and were provided with other relevant factors in mind (e.g., influence of family, peers). According to Lipsey, treatments that are structured and focused may contribute to an average 30% reduction in reoffending rates. In summary, Lipsey's findings were pivotal in underscoring the importance of correctional treatment, and more significantly, appropriate treatment (i.e., multimodal, skills-oriented, and cognitive/behavioural), in contributing to improved outcomes for delinquents.

Andrew, Zinger and colleagues (1990) specified in detail the role of appropriate treatment in contributing to a reduction in recidivism. As a response to the claim by Whitehead and Lab (1989) that “interventions have little positive impact on recidivism...” (p. 276), Andrews, Zinger et al. reanalyzed their data according to the principles of effective correctional intervention (Andrews, Bonta et al., 1990). In the replication and expansion of the juvenile and adult correctional literature, they found that appropriate correctional service, based on the principles of risk, need and responsivity, was more effective in reducing recidivism (mean phi = 0.30) than unspecified correctional service (-0.06) and non service criminal sanctioning (-0.07). Not only did they find sup-port for appropriate treatment, but they also found that treatment effects were maintained across statistical controls for various methodological factors (e.g., sample size) that contributed to the effect size. These results, and those presented by Lipsey (1990), clearly favour the efficacy of correctional treatment (and particularly intervention efforts guided by program integrity as well as the principles of risk, need, and responsivity) in contributing to a reduced likelihood of recidivism.

In light of these meta-analytic findings on the overall treatment literature, theorizing regarding treatment efficacy has progressed from the question “Does treatment work” for, as Lipsey (1995) contends, it is no longer a question of whether intervention is effective in reducing recidivism. We know that treatment “works” and we must use the information derived from research to develop effective intervention strategies for offenders who manifest employment needs.

These principles were linked together by Andrews and Bonta (1994, 1998), who present a model detailing the various components that influence treatment services to offenders, building on the foundation provided by earlier research (Andrews & Kiessling, 1980; Hoge & Andrews, 1986; as cited in Andrews & Bonta, 1998). In conducting a comprehensive correctional program evaluation, Andrews and Bonta (1994) assert that following elements must be considered:

• Surrounding community and/or agency conditions,
• Preservice client characteristics,
• Preservice counsellor characteristics,
• Program characteristics,
• Process and content of treatment service,
• Intermediate treatment goals, and
• Ultimate outcomes.

If employment is considered a program, then these same principles apply to the provision of effective employment interventions. In this section, pertinent employment research findings will be applied within each of these elements comprising effective correctional treatment.

It is important to recognize that these program components do not occur in a vacuum, but interact in their contribution to program effectiveness (Andrews & Bonta, 1998). In order to gain a better understanding of the “black box” of treatment (Gendreau, 1996), program evaluation should explore these components in a holistic, interactive manner.

Surrounding community and/or agency conditions

Andrews and Bonta (1998) describe surrounding community conditions as the “broader social-structural, cultural and political-economic conditions” (p. 89) that impact on clients, staff, type of intervention and outcomes. Within the realm of employment, political climate has played an integral role in the perception of institutional work for offenders.

“From its beginnings, the evolution of prison industry has been intertwined with changing notions concerning the complex causes of human behaviour and with fluctuations in correctional philosophy. Shifting public attitudes toward corrections in general, and industries in particular, produced restrictions that stunted industries growth.” (Miller & Greiser, 1986, p. 14).

This is analogous to the perception of treatment, in general, that has fluctuated with prevailing political climate. Generally, widespread support and optimism for rehabilitation was sup-planted by anti-treatment sentiment, followed by a more cautious and empirically informed interpretation of effective approaches to treatment.³

The dual role allocated to offender employment is an issue that has persisted throughout the history of prison industries. Miller and Greiser (1986) contend that one goal of prison industry is the reduction of costs associated with incarceration. The secondary goal, however, has varied with prevailing correctional ideology.

Initially, prison employment, with its moralistic and punitive overtone, was provided with a view to “reform the misguided”. Later, institutional employment was perceived as providing a mechanism for offender rehabilitation and reintegration. However, a decline in prison industries was evidenced early in the 20th century due to community opposition to marketplace competition following the Great Depression. Additionally, access to alternative activities designed to keep offenders occupied (e.g., institutional libraries) contributed to the downsizing of industries operations. Moreover, the post-depression era was associated with adoption of the “medical model” of correctional rehabilitation, which viewed offenders as individuals who were ill and in need of treatment. Employment, with its promotion of work ethic, did not fit with this focus on diagnosis, classification, and treatment and was there-fore perceived as offering minimal rehabilitative value within this correctional philosophy (Funke et al., 1982; Miller & Greiser, 1986). Miller and Greiser credit Glaser (1964) with increasing recognition of the relationship between prison industry and offender reintegration, due largely to his pivotal research on pre-release preparation, post-release employment and recidivism. Glaser reported that successful probationers were twice as likely to make use of the skills they had developed through institutional work programs than probationers who were unsuccessful during their release.

Although goals have varied over time, Miller and Grieser describe the contemporary era of prison industries as “characterized by a resurgence of interest in prison industries and a new integrative correctional philosophy” (p. 1), consistent with a rehabilitative approach to dealing with offenders. This view on the role of industries has been echoed in more recent offender employment-related research (Gaes et al., 1999; Gerber & Fritsch, 1995; Gillis, 1998; Ryan, 1998; Simon, 1999). The reintegrative value of institutional employment is recognized internationally, even by correctional systems differing radically in their guiding philosophies and ideologies (Van Zyl Smit & Dünkel, 1999).

These early themes are still evident in current theorizing on the dual, and sometimes conflicting, role of correctional industries -- the “struggle between philosophies” (Miller & Greiser, 1986, p. 3) -- namely, economic versus rehabilitative returns. Simon (1999), in her research on employment in British prisons, reported that shop instructors recognized both production of goods and promotion of skill development in offenders as important objectives. When asked to rate the relative importance of these goals, instructors emphasized the production of high quality goods as the principal objective of industries work; Simon proposed that instructors require clarification of their role, so as to prioritize offender development over production of goods. However, these industry objectives are not necessarily mutually exclusive, as illustrated in a typology of goals related to modern day correctional industries proposed by Guynes and Greiser (1986).

According to Guynes and Greiser, the various goals associated with prison employment impact the offender, the institution, and society. Institution-based goals contribute to the orderly operation of the institution and include the attainment of such objectives as reducing idleness, structuring daily activities, and reducing costs within the correctional agency. The reduction of idleness has been a goal since the inception of offender-based employment programs, as it addresses the important custodial function of occupying offenders in a constructive manner during incarceration (Greiser, 1996; Maguire, 1996). Additionally, offenders employed with prison industries may adapt better to institutional life (Flanagan & Maguire, 1987; Gleason, 1986). For example, Maguire reported that prison industry contributed to a reduction in the number of institutional infractions incurred by offenders employed by correctional industries, relative to a comparison group who did not participate in industrial pro-grams. Similarly, Saylor and Gaes (1996) found that relative to a comparison group, offenders who participated in industries, vocational training or apprenticeship programs were less likely to receive misconduct reports in the year prior to release. Moreover, research by Simon (1999) provided insights into the manner in which shop instructors and offenders participating in industries programs regard the institutional and reintegrative (community-based) impacts of institutional employment programs. Although reserved in their endorsement of the impact of institutional work experience on securing a job after release, instructors felt that industries work in prison contributed to positive outcomes for offenders at the institutional level. Similar sentiments were expressed by offenders; although only one quarter (of 117) of offenders surveyed felt that institutional employment offered any value in contributing to work opportunities on release, more than half (56%) reported that institutional work placement assisted them in coping with living in the institution. In her survey of offenders incarcerated in the state of Michigan, Gleason reported similar findings on offender perceptions of the value of institutional employment.

Society-based goals involve repayment to society through such means as financially assisting dependents in the community, and providing victims with restitution. These goals are based on the premise that offenders are responsible for repaying the costs resulting from their criminal actions. Furthermore, their contribution to the production of goods for the state serves to defray some of the costs associated with their incarceration (Guynes & Greiser, 1986).

Most important in relation to rehabilitation and reintegration, offender-based goals include such areas as attainment of positive work habits, real work experience/vocational training, and more concrete objectives, including money management skills and release money. The focus within an offender-based framework is reintegration and rehabilitation (Guynes & Greiser, 1986; Flanagan, 1988).

Preservice client characteristics

Preservice client characteristics, namely: risk, need and responsivity, is an important factor that has been highly overlooked in evaluation of the employment literature. Although our knowledge of risk is good, it has not been adequately used in placing offenders into employment positions, nor has information on offender risk and need levels been effectively used in evaluating treatment gain. Many studies have been conducted regarding the impact of employment programs on recidivism, but few have explored important program characteristics, staff characteristics, or more surprisingly, offender characteristics.

Risk

Motiuk and Belcourt (1996) conducted one of the few employment-based studies to consider offender risk levels. This study examined post-release outcome for a group of 269 offenders who participated in CORCAN at least six months prior to conditional release and who spent a minimum of one year in the community following release. CORCAN, a special operating system within the Correctional Service of Canada, employs offenders in institutional manufacturing, agribusiness, construction, services (i.e., key-boarding, data entry, and telemarketing) and textiles operations. Monthly, CORCAN employs 2000 full-time equivalent positions. In one year, 4000 offenders are employed by CORCAN, with an average stay of approximately one month.

Motiuk and Belcourt compared rates of return for offenders released on full parole and statutory release with national aver-age recidivism rates. CORCAN participants released on full parole were returned to federal custody at a rate of 19.2%, whereas the national average was 26.6%, which constitutes a difference in return of 27.8%. The results were more pronounced for return to federal custody for a new offence, with 12.1% national aver-age rate of return and only 1.9% for CORCAN participants (a difference of 84.3%). This finding of a substantially lower rate of return did not apply for CORCAN participants on statutory release (46.4% versus 44.0%), indicating an interaction between success on release and risk level. No differences were obtained in return to federal custody for a new offence among offenders on statutory release. Furthermore, analyses indicated that offenders in this sample released on full parole were categorized as lower risk to reoffend than offenders on statutory release, substantiating the link between risk level and propensity to successfully reintegrate into the community.

Need

Although risk is important, it is desirable to ascertain how dynamic factors impinge upon outcome for offenders. To this end, the preliminary study conducted by Motiuk and Belcourt was expanded to consider employment needs among this sample of offenders and the relationship to community reintegration. Gillis, Motiuk, and Belcourt (1998) expanded the initial follow-up period by one year (average follow-up 23 months) and reported employment status for a subset (n = 99) of the 269 offenders who initially comprised the sample. Consistent with the risk assessment literature, the authors reported an interaction between overall risk level, employment needs, and employment status during the first six months of release.

More than half of the offenders in the sample exhibited employment needs on release and two thirds experienced difficulty obtaining employment in the first six months of release. When overall risk and need scores were examined in relation to employment status, analyses indicated that offenders classified as higher risk were much less likely to be employed than lower risk offenders. Results of particular interest involve the relationship between employment status and reoffence. Offenders who were employed were convicted at less than half the rate of unemployed offenders (17% versus 41%) and committed only one quarter as many new violent offences as unemployed offenders (6% versus 21%). When employment needs were subdivided into their four components (“asset,” “no need,” “some need,” and “considerable need”), it is particularly telling that all offenders identified as having employment as an asset (n = 6) were employed, and none recidivated during the follow-up period. Conversely, no offenders identified with considerable needs (n = 15) obtained employment, and 43.8% were convicted of a new offence in the follow-up period.

It is important to note that the two studies derived from this sample did not have control groups, which limits the conclusions that may be drawn. However, these preliminary “snapshots” of offenders who worked for CORCAN during incarceration suggest that employment plays a potentially important role in assisting offenders in their reintegrative efforts. Furthermore, this research has served as the basis for the development of more stringent studies that will contribute to an enhanced understanding of how employment contributes to safe community reintegration (see Gillis, 1998).

Responsivity

Responsivity is an area that has not been explored in evaluating employment programs. Responsivity refers to a style and mode of program delivery that is consistent with the learning style and ability of offenders.⁴

Other areas relating to responsivity include gender and ethnicity. More specifically, women and Aboriginal offenders may have specific employment needs and responsivity factors to consider, and may manifest different competencies. It is important to identify factors that may be specific to these populations through research, and to follow-up accordingly with programs designed to meet their specific employment needs.

Additionally, motivation, although proposed as a potential responsivity factor has received surprisingly little attention in the correctional treatment literature. Recently, Tellier (1999) developed a theoretical framework for the incorporation of motivation as a contributing factor to offenders' readiness to change their behaviour. The framework is based on the concept that motivation levels fluctuate as offenders progress through different stages of change (Prochaska & DiClemente, 1984). Inclusion of assessment processes based on the theoretical model proposed by Tellier would contribute to a refinement in our understanding of how program readiness impacts on offenders' treatment gain in employment programs. Ultimately, the model could contribute to increased appreciation of the role of motivation in contributing to employment stability and safe community reintegration. Such an approach recognizes that offenders enter treatment with varying levels of readiness to change and willingness to address their needs and therefore require different levels of program intensity.

Preservice counsellor characteristics

Andrews and Bonta (1998) specify the importance of counsellor training skills and ability to establish a warm interpersonal relationship with the client in contributing to positive program out-comes. Moreover, inherent in a cognitive behavioural/social learning programmatic framework is the idea that prosocial modelling is a key element to behaviour change among program participants.

In the employment context, CORCAN instructors spend the majority of the day with offenders and therefore play a potentially important role in the skill development, attitude, and behavioural change among offenders (Fabiano, LaPlante, & Loza, 1996; Gillis, Getkate, Robinson, & Porporino, 1995).

As part of an employability research initiative in CORCAN, Gillis (1994) conducted a study exploring the relationship between instructor leadership styles, perceived credibility and performance; and offender-reported measures of work attitudes and motivation. A multi-source assessment approach incorporating measures obtained from work instructors, offenders and managers, was used to assess the impact of instructor attributes on offender work motivation. Managers (n = 7), work instructors (n = 35) and offenders (n = 143). Seven institutions from the Correctional Service of Canada participated in this research.

Supervisor leadership behaviours were assessed using the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ; Bass & Avolio, 1990), which examines transactional, transformational and non-leadership behaviour. Transactional leaders participate in exchanges with their employees, rewarding predetermined objectives and punishing employees for failing to attain goals. An augmenting effect beyond that of transactional leaders is characteristic of transformational leaders, who inspire and stimulate employees to perform beyond their expectations in achieving goals. These charismatic leaders are noted for their motivational coaching styles and ability to adapt their approach to meet individual employee needs. As opposed to this active, mentoring form of leadership, non-leadership is characterised by a “laissez-faire” approach (Bass, 1985, 1990; Bass & Avolio, 1990). The MLQ also examines organizational outcome measures, such as extra effort exerted by employees. In addition to these leadership qualities, this study explored a measure of perceived instructor credibility, comprised of trust, inspiration and competence adapted from Kouzes & Posner (1993).

Supervisors and offenders completed the leadership questionnaire, and offenders also completed the credibility questionnaire, and a set of scales designed to assess work motivation, including: intrinsic job motivation, meaningfulness of work, responsibility for work outcomes, and job involvement. Offender punctuality ratings compiled by instructors provided a behavioural measure of offender motivation. Finally, managers completed a modified version of the leadership questionnaire, evaluating instructor effectiveness in obtaining extra effort from offenders in their shops and increasing shop productivity.

Analyses of the data supported the hypothesis that active transformational leadership is associated with motivational out-comes in employees. Instructors rated by offenders as displaying transformational behaviours were associated with higher levels of extra effort, work motivation, and job involvement reported by offenders. Importantly, offender-rated instructor transformational leadership was significantly related to offender punctuality ratings. Moreover, a particularly strong finding was the association between manager ratings of instructor effectiveness and offender-reported extra effort exerted in the workplace and offender punctuality ratings. As hypothesized, a non-leadership instructor orientation was linked lower levels of offender-reported work motivation, job involvement, and willingness to exert extra effort. Transactional leadership was not associated with offender-reported work attitudes nor punctuality ratings (Gillis, 1994; Gillis et al., 1995).

This research extended and substantiated results from an earlier study conducted by Crookall (1989), who found that instructors trained in transformational leadership (versus situational leadership) were associated with significant improvements in personal growth, as gauged by turnover, work habits, respect, job skills, citizenship and progress toward rehabilitation.

The research also provided important information regarding the pivotal role of correctional staff in influencing offenders. Prior to this study, most research on correctional staff explored corrections-related attitudes, but failed to evaluate how these attitudes and behaviours impact on offenders. Moreover, this leadership research illustrates the importance of appropriate staff selection and staff training strategies. Future staff training should incorporate not only leadership training, but also effective approaches to working with offender populations. As demonstrated in the leadership research, offenders respond differentially to leadership styles. Training should also incorporate how to provide instruction to offenders (i.e., coaching offenders) in a manner that responds to the offender's particular learning style, in accordance with responsivity principle. Moreover, the mode of delivery should be based on the risk and needs principle, with offenders manifesting significant employment needs given a higher level of one-on-one intervention. As illustrated in these studies (Crookall, 1989; Gillis, 1994), modelling is key for program delivery, a finding consistent with meta-analytic research on treatment effectiveness. Finally, not only did this research substantiate the treatment effectiveness literature in a different context -- offender institutional employment -- but it also provided support for the utility and validity of the trans-formational leadership typology within a correctional context.

Program characteristics

Treatment setting is a program component that is particularly relevant in the context of employment training. Currently within the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC), the majority of systematic employment training programs are offered at the institutional level. Importantly and increasingly, employment program operations are attempting to parallel those found in community, with expectations of performance from offenders consistent with community standards.

Given that meta-analytic results support the increased efficacy of community-based treatment over institutional intervention, more focus should be placed on community-based employment initiatives for offenders (Andrews et al., 1990; Lipsey, 1990). Although institutional employment opportunities contribute to the offender's potential for safe and effective community reintegration (Motiuk & Belcourt, 1996; Saylor & Gaes, 1996), more intensive effort should focus on community-based initiatives that offer job readiness training, job placement strategies and on-the-job training opportunities. Additionally, there is a need for follow-up sessions and systematic intervention at the community level. More specifically, community employment placement and training opportunities are required to: facilitate the linkage and ease the transition to the community, provide financial support and promote peer support and effective prosocial role models to offenders upon release. This approach is consistent with policy recommendations in the recent Report to EXCOM on Employment (CSC, 1999), which advocates enhancement of CORCAN community operations, and development and implementation of national short-term employability programs for offenders at the institutional and community levels.

Process and content of treatment service

As a subset of overall risk, employment offers real potential for change among offenders with its focus on combining concrete skills-based training with the development and enhancement of generic employability skills, transferable to community employment settings. Research has shown that shop instructors and offenders agree that institutional employment has the potential to enhance offender work habits and attitudes (Gillis, 1994; Simon, 1999). The focus on general employability skills, as opposed to very concrete and job-specific skills, has received increasing attention in the Canadian correctional employment system (see CSC, 1999; Fabiano et al., 1996; Gillis, Robinson, & Porporino, 1996; Mulgrew, 1996).

Since the early 1990s, CORCAN has placed high priority on developing employability skills in offenders. CORCAN has worked closely with the Conference Board of Canada, who surveyed Canadian employers regarding attributes they look for in effective employees (McLaughlin, 1992). Using the Conference Board of Canada criteria and research findings from the early employ-ability initiative, CORCAN in collaboration with the Research Branch, developed the Offender Performance Evaluation to refine assessment of offender employment skills and competencies. The form evaluates generic academic, personal management and teamwork skills identified by the Conference Board of Canada in their Employability Skills Profile as integral for effective work performance. Scored on the basis of behavioural indicators, the form provides concrete information to correctional staff and offenders regarding offender work competencies and need areas. Easy to score and interpret, the form also provides a mechanism for feedback regarding offender work performance and goals for future intervention. The form is currently in use in CORCAN shops, although its application will be expanded to all work placements in the attempt to adequately assess how institutional employment experience contributes to offender employability skills.

A primary objective of correctional employment is the pro-vision of job skills and enhancement of positive work attitudes that will assist offenders in their reintegration to the community upon release. This approach recognizes that generic skills are important, as often, community job placements are not consistent with institutional employment training experience (Simon, 1999). Employment is provided to offenders in the anticipation that work habits and attitudes will generalize across different work situations (i.e., in the community upon release). It is postulated that the enhancement of positive work attitudes will ultimately translate into behavioural change. Results reported in Gillis (1994) indicate that behavioural differences, in the form of better punctuality ratings, have been noted among offenders with more positive work attitudes and higher levels of motivation. However, further research is required to address the potential impact of work attitudes and specific employability skills on community employment and reintegration.

Intermediate treatment goals

In evaluating program effectiveness, it is important to keep in mind that many evaluations have used recidivism as the sole criterion of program effectiveness. These studies, therefore, do not account for more intermediate outcomes that one would anticipate as resulting from employment programs, namely, increase in specific and generic skills, and employment status upon release. Understandably, these factors are often excluded due to the difficulty in monitoring long-term, and even short-term, outcomes associated with community adjustment.

As described in the previous section, an important intermediate outcome of employment is the development of employability skills -- generic skills transferable to numerous work settings. In exploring treatment gain, it is important to examine offender perceptions of the attitudes and skills that are developed or enhanced as a function of participation in institutional employment pro-grams. To this end, the Offender Performance Evaluation will allow for the examination of how particular skills impact on offenders' ability to find and keep work in the community, while on release. Future research will incorporate the information relating to change in skills as a function of participation in CORCAN (tracking offenders' employability skills from the time they start working for CORCAN, to completion of their work) in the attempt to gain an enhanced understanding of the impact of skill development on subsequent reintegration for offenders. Coupled with employment needs data from the OIA, this information has potential utility in contributing to the effective assessment of treatment gain.

A logical intermediate outcome of employment programming is employment status and/or job retention. However, Ryan (1998), in her review of the job retention literature, asserts that job placement was used frequently as an outcome variable in research in the 1 969s and 1970s, but was rarely tracked in subsequent research. Her review of the literature “revealed an almost complete lack of a systematic, logically developed body of knowledge about job retention of released inmates” (p. 9). Clearly, employment stability -- or job retention -- must be included as a crucial proximal outcome measure in community-based offender employment research (Gillis, 1998; Ryan, 1998; Simon, 1999). In evaluating employment training strategies for offenders, it is imperative that researchers look beyond recidivism to other pertinent proximal outcomes measures of program success (Braithwaite, 1980; Hodanish, 1976) to include dynamic factors associated with finding and keeping work.

Saylor and Gaes (1996) produced one of the few studies exploring community employment status. They reported that offenders who participated in industries, vocational or apprenticeship programs, or a combination of the two, were 24% more likely to obtain employment on conditional release than a matched control group.

Conversely, Markley, Flynn, and Bercaw-Dooen (1983), in a study examining employment success in a sample of offenders who had received job skills training, found no effect of training in the experimental group, relative to a control group matched on age, sex, race, education and skill level prior to training. More specifically, offenders who had received vocational training did not differ from the control group on the “success index,” which measured months employed per year and yearly earnings during release. Importantly, however, the “success index” used by the authors to evaluate outcome represents a significant contribution to the employment literature.

Lipsey (1995) also reported upon the relationship between treatment efficacy and various outcomes other than delinquency. In his analysis, he examined the global effects of treatment on the following non-delinquency outcomes: psychological outcome (e.g., attitudes, self esteem), interpersonal adjustment (e.g., peer or family relationships), school participation (e.g., attendance, dropout), academic performance (e.g., grades, achievement tests), and vocational performance (e.g., job status, wages). An overall ‘success rate' was calculated by splitting each of the outcome measures at the median; treatment and control groups were compared on their attainment of the minimum median value on outcome (i.e., their relative success rates). In a comparable fashion to delinquency outcome, positive treatment effects were found on each of the non-delinquency outcomes, ranging from 10% improvement to 30% improvement. An average effect of 10% was obtained for vocational accomplishment in the studies (n = 44) explored by Lipsey.

Additionally, we need to explore not only whether an offender is employed, but whether she or he is gainfully employed. An ongoing project in the research branch is exploring these questions in a community-based study of offender employment (see Gillis, 1998).

Ultimate outcomes

Although recidivism is an important criterion to consider, it should not be used as the sole outcome measure of program effectiveness, particularly in the context of employment (Hodanish, 1976). Furthermore, Ryan (1998) raises important issues regarding the reliability of recidivism statistics as criterion measures, and provides a good argument for not relying solely on recidivism as the criterion of program effectiveness.

As previously outlined, very few well-controlled studies of employment impacts on recidivism have been conducted but overall, employment intervention is promising in its potential to reduce recidivism (Pearson & Lipton, 1999). Saylor and Gaes (1996) provided one of the best controlled studies in their prospective evaluation of the impact of institutional employment and vocational training on offenders' post-release performance. Study group participants consisted of offenders who had participated in prison industries (57%), combined industrial and vocational experience (19%) and vocational and/or apprenticeship training (24%). The study also included a statistically matched comparison sample of offenders released in the same calendar quarter as the employment group. Long-term follow-up (range 8 to 12 years) provided important information about the impact of training on post-release recidivism.

The study examined not only federal recommitment (i.e., for a new offence or supervision revocation) but also time in community until recommitment. Men who participated in correctional industries survived in the community 20% longer than a comparison group, and the vocational or apprenticeship training group, 28% longer. Although results for the employment/training group were not statistically significant, the same trend was noted. Saylor and Gaes suggest that additional employment-related variables should be examined for their impact on community adjustment following release from prison.

Summary

This section delineated the importance of considering numerous factors that impinge upon the ability of a program to effect change among offenders. The individual's characteristics, including the level of risk he or she presents for future involvement in crime, the intensity of the manifested need, and the individual's amenability to treatment are important factors to consider in combination with actual treatment characteristics. Program evaluation should incorporate intermediate measures of program effectiveness, minimally including community employment status as a pertinent outcome measure.

THEORETICAL MODEL

The need for an integrated theoretical perspective on employment cannot be disputed. Before effective programs can be developed and implemented for offenders, one first requires an understanding of the various factors and processes that combine to influence not only reintegration potential, but also employment stability in the community.

As previously mentioned, many studies to date have explored employment primarily in relation to recidivism, an approach which neglects important proximal outcomes. Exploration of intermediate targets is crucial for several reasons. First, many employment programs promote the development of job specific skills, but often, community employment opportunities are not consistent with those offered in the institution. Use of recidivism as the sole criterion of program effectiveness ignores other important potential gains from employment participation, including job attainment, job retention, and increased prosocial orientation (Gillis, 1998; Ryan, 1998). Safe community reintegration, however, is the ultimate objective of the provision of programs to offenders, and should be included in a comprehensive theoretical perspective on employment.

A theoretical model was recently formulated to assist in the prediction of employment stability (Gillis, 1998). Revised from a theoretical model to predict criminal behaviour (see Gillis, 1997), the model adopts a social learning/social cognition perspective in its amalgamation of the theoretical perspective proposed by Andrews and Bonta (Andrews, 1982, 1995; Andrews & Bonta, 1998 and by Ajzen 1985; Ajzen & Fishbein, 1980 Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975). Furthermore, the model incorporates the risk factors most predictive of recidivism.

The Personal Interpersonal Community-Reinforcement perspective (PIC-R; Andrews, 1982, 1995; Andrews & Bonta, 1998) was formulated to account for inhibitory and facilitatory factors related to criminal offending. The theory employs a social learning perspective in its specification of the interrelationships between (a) personally-mediated events, comprised primarily of the individual's attitudes, values and beliefs, and personality, which in turn, impact upon personally-mediated control (e.g., self-regulation and cognitive functioning); (b) interpersonally-mediated control, consisting of the influence of others (i.e., associates/social support) via modelling, expressed approval, etc.; and (c) automatic rewards, which typically gain their rewarding properties through previous experience. These proximal factors, in interaction with more distal contextual elements (such as neighbourhood), influence the manner in which the individual perceives the costs/rewards for criminal behaviour. In the model, the PIC-R perspective borrows from the theory of planned behaviour in using the framework provided by the theory, and in operationalizing the various constructs that will be used in predicting employment status. The casual pathway postulates that relevant beliefs contribute to attitudes, associates, and self-efficacy. Intention mediates the impact of attitudes, associates and self-efficacy on behaviour. For the present study, this model was modified to predict employment stability for offenders on conditional release, by incorporating relevant work attitudes and beliefs.

The pre-test data collection phase for this research on employment stability was completed in September 1999, and post-test data collection in March 2000. Initially, the research explores factors that contribute to employment stability. Ultimately, the study will be extended to evaluate the impact of employment stability on long-term community reintegration. Thus, this research will explore proximal and more distal outcomes potentially related to attaining and maintaining employment in the community.

The current community-based employment research will also contribute to the development of a brief employment checklist comprised of factors that are most strongly linked to community success. This list of protective factors, coupled with known employment risk factors, will assist parole officers in tracking important employment factors among offenders who manifest employment needs.

Furthermore, rather than pure reliance on the assessment of static employment deficits among offenders, this research strategy involves exploration of dynamic employment factors. Accompanying the evolution of employment assessment strategies is the potential for renewed effort to target employment strengths and competencies that will assist offenders in their community adjustment.

INNOVATIONS AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS

It can safely be asserted that there is a resurgence of interest in employment as an important factor in the safe reintegration of offenders. However, the systematic study of employment as a risk and need factor is still in its infancy. Although we know employment is important in contributing to outcomes for offenders, we are in the preliminary stage of understanding the processes and factors that are important to employment success and community reintegration.

This parallels the status of risk and needs assessment in corrections. Our knowledge of risk is good, but our understanding and ability to effectively intervene to decrease criminogenic needs is constantly evolving as our knowledge base increases. Employment, as a subset of offender needs, constitutes an important area of study. Once an enhanced understanding of the mechanisms and processes associated with employment stability is attained, this information may be used to guide the development of intervention strategies, both at the institutional and community level. Moreover, once this level of understanding has been achieved, subsequent intervention efforts should focus on responsivity issues (including gender, ethnicity, motivation, and different learning styles), which have received relatively little exploration to date in the correctional literature.

Currently, a project is in the development phase within the Research Branch, CSC, which will survey women offenders' employment histories and experiences since release. This research will assess womens' primary employment interests and training/employment programs they would find helpful. Importantly, the study will evaluate impediments to finding and maintaining employment as perceived and experienced by women on conditional release. Moreover, parole officers will be requested to respond to a survey to gain an understanding of their perspective on women offenders' employment needs and training requirements. Ultimately, the information will be used to guide employment training strategies and job readiness programs delivered at the institutional and community level for women offenders on conditional release (Gillis, 1999).

Consistent with proposals in the Task Force on Employment, an integrated strategy for institutional and community-based employment intervention is required. In particular, given the empirical support for the efficacy of community-based intervention over institutional treatment, it is proposed that more effort be placed on providing employment intervention to offenders on conditional release. Moreover, in accordance with meta-analytic findings regarding program effectiveness, it is advocated that an intensive cognitive-behavioural employment skills pro-gram be developed and offered to offenders manifesting employment needs. Such a program would involve skills development in everyday interactions with peers and co-workers and would be designed with the intention of increasing offenders' job efficacy, in addition to generic employment skills (e.g., positive work attitudes and behaviours) defined by Canadian employers as integral for successful job performance. The program would offer differing levels of intervention, so offenders with different employment needs could enter the program at varying stages, in accordance with the risk principle and consistent with the concept of stages of change. Importantly, also, this program would offer job placement opportunities, intense supervision and coaching by a qualified employment counsellor. Consideration should also be given to forecasting availability of particular types of employment in the labour market, as research has shown that jobs traditionally sought out by offenders (e.g., manual and/or unskilled labour) is no longer as plentiful as it once was (Simon, 1999).

Additionally, an important element in guiding and assessing program effectiveness is an appropriate evaluation component. All future employment intervention strategies should incorporate evaluative components that provide feedback regarding pro-gram efficacy in attaining objectives (e.g., increased knowledge, employment attainment and maintenance, and additional indicators of community adjustment).

Finally, there is reason to adopt an optimistic outlook that current research and endeavours to intervene with offenders with employment needs will yield valuable information for the development of a comprehensive and systematic employment strategy.

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¹ Correctional Service of Canada

² See Andrews, Bonta, & Hoge, 1990; Andrews & Bonta, 1998 for discussion of the risk and need principles.

⁴ For more details on Responsivity, see Chapter 5 of this Compendium: Treatment Responsivity: Reducing Recidivism by Enhancing Treatment Effectiveness, by Sharon Kennedy.

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CHAPTER 11

Treatment and Intervention Approaches with Families

CLAUDIO VIOLATO, MARK GENUIS, and ELIZABETH ODDONE-PAOLUCCI¹

This chapter deals primarily with intervention and treatment programs in corrections. It also provides a brief overview of theories of causes, in particular criminality, family, social and psychological theories. The focus of the intervention programs is on tertiary prevention, particularly for youth already convicted of crimes, with the objective of reducing rates of recidivism.²

THEORIES OF CRIMINALITY

Social control theory

Social control theorists posit that socialization is the process by which people become bonded to family, school, and law (Hirschi, 1969). In this theory, conformity is explained through socialization and bonding between the individual and society (Wiatrowski et al., 1981). This is a process whereby individuals develop commitment to society leading to some form of internal control. This bonding consists of four main elements: attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief. The stronger the bond, the less likely the person will demonstrate criminal behaviour. Social control theory maintains the importance of conventional value attachments as instrumental in the prevention of juvenile criminality, and the weakening of such attachments is likely to induce involvement in criminal behaviour.

Subculture theory

In subculture theory, individuals are socialized into violating the law as a result of their exposure and affiliation with deviant influences. The greater the youth's association with his criminal peers, the greater the possibility of differential association with them, and therefore with definitions conducive to criminality. The most commonly stressed variables in subculture formulations are criminal associates and peer approval for criminality. It follows that if criminality is committed in accordance with values and attitudes learned from peers, such behaviour should be exhibited by individuals whose friends approve of such illegal activity.

Segrave and Hastad (1985) did find criminal behaviour to be positively associated with both criminal associates and peer approval for criminality. They found that criminal companions are related to committing criminal acts, regardless of the level of attachment or of conventional attitudes for women and, especially for men. The apparent overpowering strength of peer involvement is disputed in the findings of Williamson (1978), who found that lack of appropriate activities for youth is a major determinant of criminality.

Strain theory

One of the postulates of Strain theory (Brennan, Huizinga & Elliott, 1978) is that the greatest amount of criminality is among people of lower socioeconomic status. Such a position states that there is a perception within the individual that sees only limited access to legitimate opportunities. The motivation to deviate is enhanced when individuals accept and internalize culturally formulated goals of success and perceive legitimate avenues for achieving them as severely limited. Thus criminal individuals see themselves, more so than their middle or upper class con-temporaries, as being blocked from reaching their goals. This theory postulates that such members of society are “forced” to deviate in order to achieve goals they are not able to attain through legitimate channels.

Family systems theory

There are two basic emphases in family-systems: Learning in the family focusing on modelling, child-rearing and dysfunctional relationships within the family, and Lack of affectional bonds, especially between parent-child (Henggeler, 1998).

In the first variant of family systems, the parents themselves model dysfunctional and criminal behaviour. In these families, one or more parent may be a criminal and thus pass this on to their children. Moreover, these parents have difficulty in their child-rearing practices employing harsh, punitive, and violent discipline strategies. These children have little opportunity to model self-control, restraint and moral reasoning. There are four aspects of criminality in parents that have failed to provide to their children: 1) house rules, 2) adequate parental monitoring of behaviour, 3) proper effective contingencies, and 4) adequate crises and problem solving.

The second variant of family-systems revolves around the endemic difficulty of parent-child relationships. These negative attachments are thought to create rejection in the children as well as a lack of responsibility, poor concern for consequences, impulsive behaviour and inability to learn from experience. Stott (1982) in a 5-year longitudinal study of 102 offenders, and a 10-year follow up of 700 juvenile offenders, concluded that 93 percent of criminal acts stemmed from a “breach of affectional bond between parent and child” (p. 318). The insecure attachment had been communicated to the adolescent by threatened rejection, loss of the preferred parent with no substitute, the mother was undependable, and the adolescent feared the loss of the preferred parent.

A further complicating factor in family systems is stress that can happen due to breakdown: illness, death, unemployment, abandonment, poverty, and difficulties of general living. These stresses create discord that threatens family existence and lead to maladaptive emergency response, including criminality.

Summary of theories of criminality

The major theories of criminality and statements about their relative validity are summarized in Table 11.1. It can be seen that family systems theory is indicated as having the highest validity because current data and evidence provide strong support for it. Strain theory received the poorest endorsement of validity.

TABLE 11.1 Summary of major theories of criminality and their relative validity based on current data
Theory	Explanation	Validity
Social Control Theory	Criminality is caused by individual characteristics that might be inherited, developed or learned (e.g., genetic disorders, psychiatric problems, learning disabilities).	Substantial evidence supports this view, though critics argue that this theory is not sufficient to fully explain criminality by itself
Subculture Theory	Criminality is caused when the individual fails to become properly socialized to accept the values of family, school, law and morality. Juveniles are socialized into violating the law as a result of exposure to and affiliation with deviant influences.	Evidence indicates that criminal behaviour is positively associated with criminal associates and peer approval for criminality. These, however, probably reflect antecedents to criminality rather than its cause.
Strain Theory	Criminality is caused by chronic poverty and low socioeconomic status.	There is a definite relation between poverty and criminality but this is probably a correlation rather than a cause.
Family Systems Theory	Children learn dysfunctional criminal behaviour from their parents and/or endemic difficulties of parent-child relationships that create developmental pathology in children such as criminality.	This view is one of the most currently accepted causes of criminality although substantial empirical work is still required.

Criminality is associated with numerous variables and is explained by several theories. Given the plethora of explanations and variables, complex causal models will undoubtedly be required to delineate the factors that are central to criminality. Such results from complex studies may demonstrate the multidimensional nature and causality of criminality and thus support the social-ecological model of behaviour. Thus a viable model of criminality is one that includes multiple pathways from the key systems in which youths are embedded, particularly the family.

TREATMENT AND INTERVENTION APPROACHES

The role of mental health services

The multidimensional nature of criminality requires the intervention of many agencies. Because mental health professionals have expertise in family systems and/or behavioural treatment approaches, their contribution to the effort of reducing violence among adolescents can be considerable. Many offenders may be receiving treatment from other professional sectors (private practice psychiatrists and psychologists, hospitals, counsellors and psychologists). Even so, there is unquestionably a need for further involvement of mental health services with offenders.

Figure 11.1 indicates an ideal relationship between public health (Mental Health) and the criminal justice systems in dealing with criminality. Public health strategies are aimed at understanding, reducing, and preventing risk factors to criminality not merely to responding to specific episodes. Multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary models that