ABSTRACT
Violent criminal acts and other serious crimes (i.e., index offenses) perpetrated by adolescents present significant problems at several levels of analysis, and these problems argue for the development of effective treatment approaches. On a personal level, adolescents who commit serious crimes experience numerous psychosocial problems as well as reduced educational and occupational opportunities (Melton & Pagliocca, 1992). Moreover, serious antisocial behavior by adolescents has extremely negative emotional, physical, and economic effects on victims, victims’ families, and the larger community (Gottfredson, 1989; Miller, Cohen, & Rossman, 1993). Therefore, effective treatment may not only benefit the youth and his or her family,
but may also save many persons from victimization. On an epidemiological level, adolescents, especially boys, account for a disproportionately high percentage of the arrests for violent and other serious crimes (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1996), and
such arrests greatly underestimate the prevalence of adolescent criminal activity (Elliott, Dunford, & Huizinga, 1987; Loeber, Farrington, & Waschbusch, 1998). In addition, although serious ju venile offenders and their families constitute a relatively small percentage of the population, they account for a large percentage of a community’s crime (Farrington, Ohlin, & Wilson, 1986; Loeber et al., 1998; Moffitt, 1993). Thus, if one purpose of treating juvenile offenders is to decrease crime, then serious juvenile offenders and their families are a logical target for intervention efforts.
