Searching for context: a review of “what works” reviews of interventions to prevent youth offending using the EMMIE Framework

Abstract

Purpose This study aims to examine the extent to which “What Works” reviews in youth justice enable understanding of the features of effectiveness (what works, for whom, in what circumstances and why?) specified in the Effects–Mechanisms–Moderators–Implementation–Economic cost (EMMIE) framework. Design/methodology/approach The EMMIE framework examined findings within a sample of “What Works” style reviews of preventative youth justice intervention effectiveness. Findings “What Works” style reviews of evaluations of preventative youth justice interventions often omit the requisite details required to examine all of the necessary elements of effectiveness contained within the EMMIE framework. While effectiveness measures were typically provided, the dominant evaluation evidence-base struggles to consider moderators of effect, mechanisms of change, implementation differences and cost-effectiveness. Therefore, “What Works” samples cannot facilitate sufficient understanding of “what works for whom, in what circumstances and why?”. The authors argue that Realist Synthesis can fill this gap and shed light on the contexts that shape the mechanisms through which youth justice interventions work. Originality/value The authors extended the approach adopted by an earlier review of effectiveness reviews (Tompson et al., 2020), considering more recent reviews of the effectiveness of preventative interventions using the EMMIE framework. Unlike previous reviews, the authors prioritised the utility of the EMMIE framework for assessing the factors affecting the effectiveness of preventative interventions in youth justice.

‘Child First’ and desistance

“…Asset therefore embodied a staged process of reductionism when trying to bring about desistance directly that has rendered risk a decontextualised and dehumanised artefact and hindered the possibility of understanding children's individual lived realities and how these might be influenced (O'Mahony, 2009;Phoenix, 2009;Cox, 2020). Application of RFPP peaked in November 2009 with the inception of the 'Scaled Approach' assessment and intervention framework, which dictated that formal youth justice intervention must be proportionate to the child's assessed risk of offending (YJB, 2010; see Sutherland, 2009), formally extending processes of risk-based reductionism and invalidity into the sphere of intervention but justified by an undertheorised, partial and inconsistent evidence base for the 'effectiveness' of risk assessment and risk-based interventions (Case et al, 2022).…”