Pre- to Posttreatment Differences in Measures of Risk of Relapse and Reoffending for Participants of RAPt’s 6-week Programs

Abstract

This study evaluated the impact of two short-term, Rehabilitation for Addicted Prisoners Trust (RAPt), substance dependence treatment programs on the psychological processes they target, which are associated with relapse and/or reoffending. Posttreatment scores across subscales of three psychometric measures were compared to baseline scores for 2,299 alcohol and/or drug dependent adult male prisoners that engaged with the Alcohol Dependence Treatment Programme (ADTP) or the Bridge Programme in custody. Subsequent OLS regression analyses indicated that, while key variables such as age, ethnicity, offense type, main substance used, and completion status were held constant, participants of the programs made significant gains regarding motivation to change problematic substance abusing behavior, self-efficacy for abstaining from drugs and/or alcohol in high-risk situations, and social problem-solving skills.

KEYWORDS:

• addicted offenders
• offender rehabilitation
• prison-based programs
• program evaluation
• risk factors
• substance abuse treatment outcomes

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Gail Jones, RAPt’s Dep. CEO and founder of the RAPt Research Team, participated in the design of this study and in the decision to submit the manuscript for publication. Past members of the Research Team, namely Emily Dickenson, assisted greatly with the data entry process, which enabled such a large sample to be included in the analysis. Wendy Cooper from the Cognitive Centre in Cardiff offered the authors advice regarding the scoring procedure for the SPSI-R:S measure.