How do Drug Courts Work?

Abstract

The Urban Institute, the Center for Court Innovation, and RTI International conducted NIJ's Multi-Site Adult Drug Court Evaluation. This presentation describes results of a multivariate model that tests whether assignment to drug court alone affect outcomes; whether drug court practices moderate outcomes, and if drug court practices mediate moderated outcomes by changing attitudes and beliefs. Findings for drug use using a mediated moderator model are presented.

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Presentation Overview

• Background
• Proposed Model
• Analytic Strategy
• Results
• Next Steps

Intuition Behind SEM

• Individuals enter CJS with attributes that affect their outcomes;
• Individuals then encounter CJS interventions (drug court, BAU);
• The activities of those CJS interventions moderate the effect of attributes on offending;
• May also affect attitudes. Changes in attitudes mediates the moderation.

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