ABSTRACT
What You Need to Know
■ Prevention programs need to target key risk factors for delinquency and criminality.
■ Among the categories of risk factors are family factors, peer relationships, school factors, psychological/personality influences, and biological factors.
■ Parent training programs have been shown to have significant impact on families and children. These programs address factors from prenatal nutrition to training teachers on classroom management and discipline.
■ Schools play a crucial role in prevention by preparing youths for later education, working with families, and giving youths tools for resisting peer pressure and deviance.
■ Skills training is an important contributor to prevention and can address general social interaction or specific behaviors, such as drug use and delinquency.
■ Restorative justice seeks to repair the harm done to both the victim and the community, while simultaneously changing the behavior of the offender.
■ Restorative justice takes four primary forms: victim–offender mediation, family group counseling, neighborhood reparative boards, and sentencing/peacemaking circles.
■ Evaluations of restorative justice reveal a great deal of satisfaction among participants and some reduced recidivism, although a great deal of additional research is needed.
