About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

578 Annals Am. Acad. Pol. & Soc. Sci. 8 (2001)

handle is hein.cow/anamacp0578 and id is 1 raw text is: PREFACE The main aims of this special issue of The Annals are to examine the systematic review method and to report on some of its contributions to evi- dence-based crime prevention. The main title of this issue, What Works in Preventing Crime? signals our primary interest in identifying those inter- ventions that are effective in preventing crime and offending and that ulti- mately may lead to more effective crime prevention policy and practice. The issue's subtitle, Systematic Reviews of Experimental and Quasi-Experimen- tal Research, signals our interest in using the most rigorous methods of research synthesis and only the highest-quality research designs to evaluate the effectiveness of criminological interventions. Systematic reviews have received increased attention in recent years in the social sciences generally and in criminology and criminal justice specifi- cally. This is part of the broader interest in evidence-based policy and practice in public services (Davies, Nutley, and Smith 2000) and evidence-based crime prevention (Sherman et al. 1997, forthcoming). At the forefront of the development of systematic reviews is the newly formed Campbell Collaboration. Named after the influential experimental psychologist Donald T. Campbell (1969), this was set up for the purpose of pre- paring, maintaining, and disseminating evidence-based research on the effects of interventions in the fields of education, social welfare, and crime and justice. Its Crime and Justice Group aims to prepare and maintain sys- tematic reviews of criminological interventions and to make them accessible electronically to scholars, practitioners, policy makers, and the general pub- lic. The present work, although not officially carried out under the auspices of the Campbell Collaboration, represents an important contribution to its Crime and Justice Group, and the four systematic reviews reported here are undergoing review by the Campbell Collaboration; it is hoped that they will be approved and disseminated as Campbell reviews in due course. This issue of The Annals introduces the path-breaking work of the Camp- bell Collaboration and its Crime and Justice Group, examines key method- ological issues facing systematic reviews of criminological interventions, reports on four original systematic reviews of the effects of different interven- tions on crime and offending, and makes progress toward an evidence-based approach to preventing crime and offending. Throughout this issue, crime prevention is defined as any program or policy that causes a lower number of crimes to occur in the future than would have occurred without that program or policy. This special issue originated with the 2001 Jerry Lee Crime Prevention Symposium, a 2-day conference on systematic reviews of criminological inter- ventions, held in early April at the University of Maryland, College Park, and at the U.S. capitol building in Washington, D.C. Convened by the University of Maryland's Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice and sponsored 8

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Contact Us

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most