Ethnic and Gender Differences in Offending Patterns: Examining Family Group Conferencing Interventions among At-Risk Adolescents.

Source: (2006) Child and Adolescent Social Work Journal. 23(5-6):557-578.

This secondary study looked at the importance of ethnicity and
gender in influencing the relationship between Family Group Conferencing
and (FGC) recidivism. The FGC is a mediation procedure involving offenders,
their families, and victims of their crimes in which outcomes of material and
emotional restitution are sought. Offenders, randomly sampled to participate
in a control or experimental group, were sampled via mail, telephone, and
in-person interviews. Data from court records were utilized to obtain
recidivism rates over an 18-month period. Multivariate analysis indicated a
statistically significant difference between the re-arrest rates of FGC
participants and non-participants. Female offenders were more likely to
avoid arrest than their male counterparts. This study found that ethnicity was
not a statistically significant indicator of re-arrest. The FGC has efficacy for
juvenile offenders as (1) a cost-effective method to intervene with offenders in
their own communities (2) provides alternatives to formal adjudication for
vulnerable populations—females and people of color. (author’s abstract)