The Intensity and Timing of Sex Offender Treatment.

Current evidence about the impact of specialized sex offender treatment on reoffending remains inconsistent, drawing attention to the need to focus more on those program characteristics that potentially moderate outcome. This review considers current professional perspectives and evidence on two defining aspects of treatment: its intensity and timing. It is concluded that insufficient evidence currently exists to articulate best practice in this area and there is a pressing need to collect empirical evidence about the effectiveness of different intensity treatments offered at different stages of sentence.

Interventions to Prevent and Respond to Violence Against Justice-Involved Young Women: A Scoping Review.

Young women who have had contact with the criminal justice system (justice-involved young women) have an increased risk of being a victim of violence. However, no reviews have synthesized the evidence on interventions to prevent or respond to violence against justice-involved young women. We conducted a scoping review to identify interventions designed to prevent or respond to violence against justice-involved young women. We searched Medline, Criminal Justice Abstracts, Web of Science, and Google Scholar for peer-reviewed and gray literature published in English from January 1, 2000 until March 23, 2021. Consistent with the public health approach to violence, we included primary, secondary, and tertiary interventions. Excluding duplicates, our search returned 5,603 records, 14 of which met our inclusion criteria. We narratively synthesized the included studies, all of which were conducted in the United States. Most included studies examined a tertiary intervention (n = 10), and few examined a primary (n = 2) or secondary (n = 2) intervention. Across the Joanna Briggs Institute Critical Appraisal Tools, the percentage of items met ranged from 0% to 78%. There was some limited evidence that tertiary interventions that included cognitive behavioral therapy reduced the mental health impacts of violence victimization among justice-involved young women. There was little evidence on primary and secondary interventions. Effective and evidence-based interventions to prevent violence victimization and revictimization against justice-involved young women remains a critical gap in knowledge.

Primary Crime Prevention Apps: A Typology and Scoping Review.

In the last decade, an array of smartphone apps have been designed to prevent crime, violence, and abuse. The evidence base of these apps has, however, yet to analyzed systematically. To rectify this, the aims of this review were (1) to establish the extent, range, and nature of research into smartphone apps with a primary crime prevention function; (2) to locate gaps in the primary crime prevention app literature; and (3) to develop a typology of primary crime prevention apps. Employing a scoping review methodology and following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines, studies were identified via Web of Science, EBSCOhost, and Google Scholar. We included English-language research published between 2008 and 2020 that examined smartphone applications designed explicitly for primary crime prevention. Sixty-one publications met our criteria for review, out of an initial sample of 151 identified. Our review identified six types of crime prevention app examined in these publications: self-surveillance apps, decision aid apps, child-tracking apps, educational apps, crime-mapping/alert apps, and crime reporting apps. The findings of our review indicate that most of these forms of primary crime prevention apps have yet to be rigorously evaluated and many are not evidence-based in their design. Consequently, our review indicates that recent enthusiasm over primary crime prevention apps is not supported by an adequate evidence base.

Understanding Engagement With Forensic Smartphone Apps: The Service Design Engagement Model.

Justice services have begun to integrate the use of mobile applications into treatment, support, and rehabilitative programs for forensic clients. One such application that been adopted to support forensic clients is "eRecovery": a smartphone application that provides clients recovering from a substance addiction with support for managing relapse. In this article, we report on evaluation findings from a trial of eRecovery in an Australian Community Justice Centre, and reflect on several issues relating to fostering and sustaining client engagement with similar applications within forensic and justice settings. We propose the Service Design Engagement Model to organize, visualize, and describe the stages and factors important to adoption, appropriation, and on-going routine use of the software by forensic clients. The model recognizes the role of contextual and environmental factors in supporting users through the early stages of engagement, and the importance of user agency in longer-term engagement with therapeutic apps.

An Integrated Approach for Delivering Current Astrobiology Research to the General Public.

This article describes a multifaceted approach to delivering results from current research in astrobiology to visitors at Pacific Science Center, along with the evaluated results of the impact of the work. Content was delivered by (1) training scientists to communicate effectively with the public, (2) providing the trained scientists with venues to engage with the public, and (3) creating two Science on Sphere shows that highlight key tenants scientists are investigating, a hands-on activity to facilitate interactive learning, and a temporary exhibit that highlights current research on the topic. Evaluation of visitors who engaged with each element demonstrates that the content had a large impact on both the increase in knowledge of the visitors and the increase of interest in the topic.