Comments On "Something That Works in Juvenile Justice"

Abstract

The article discusses reasons for praising the Intensive Protective Supervision Project as evaluated by Land, McCall, and Williams. These reasons include (a) the random assignment of probationers to a target and comparison group, (b) maintenance of good records about the process of intervention and relevant characteristics of the clients, (c) and tentative results suggesting that the prevention effort has been successful. The article suggests using dose- response evaluations that include measures of the amount of individuation, of the degree of supervision, and of the quality of behavior evaluation. It also suggests considering differential effects of treatment for different types of families as well as for different types of juveniles. Although judgment about the success of the treatment approach ispremature, short-term results are promising. The full records will enable a more complete evaluation.