Scared Straight Program

Scared Straight Program

Introduction

Analysis of the problems of countering negative phenomena shows that the legal literature often uses the term "prevention" or "prevention" juvenile delinquency and crime: in this context, the term "prevention of crime" is defined as a complex system of deterrence or pre-emptive effect on criminal phenomena, processes, having to reduce their criminological effect until the complete destruction or neutralization, and the creation of conditions that would rule out the possibility of such events. Crime prevention is the most humane way to deal with it. The basis of prevention of juvenile delinquency is the fundamental principles that are typical of the concept of crime prevention in general (Sherman, et al. 1998). However, there are certain prevention programs which may become harmful for young juveniles or children at-risk. Programs like 'Scared Straight' involve organized visits to prison facilities by juvenile delinquents or children at risk of offending (Feinstein, 2005). The programs are designed to deter participants from committing future crimes, to provide direct observations of prison life and interaction with adult inmates. The results of this review indicate that these programs not only fail to prevent crime, but actually generate more criminal behavior.

Objectives

The study intends to assess the impacts of scared straight programs in which organized visits of juvenile delinquents or pre-delinquents to prisons are arranged with the aim of discouraging the criminal activities.

Research question

Why scared straight programs do not affect juvenile delinquents or pre-delinquents despite being used extensively?

Method

This research study is conducted under the mixed method in which both qualitative and quantitative methods are used. And it will use both the primary, as well as secondary sources. Qualitative data will be gathered through secondary data accumulation, which will base on previous renowned and well acknowledge researches and primary data will be gathered through the semi-structured interviews of both the visited juvenile delinquents and pre-juveniles along with their organizers. The interview questions will be formulated after extensive literature review of previously conducted studies. The mixed method increased the credibility of any research study because in it the results are verified through different processes.

Data analysis

Thematic inductive approach was used to analyze the data gathered from observations and in-depth interviews. Thematic analysis is the standard tool for the study of the opinions categorization of themes contained in analysis (Feinstein, 2005). The findings obtained from thematic analysis did yield a meaningful picture of the phenomenon under study (Leininger, 1985, pp.33-72). The research objectives were to discover the impacts of scared straight programs on juveniles' possibility of committing crimes. In reaction to this, the author carried out a thematic analysis, to ensure the themes are surfaced from the data instead of being forced by the researcher.

Discussion

“Scared Straight” is the name of the program which is designed to deter or discourage the juveniles or pre-juveniles from committing crimes in future. In this program, participants are make visited the prisons in which they observe the inmates first hand and also interacts with the adult prisoners. Such kinds of programs are much popular ...