NCJ Number
94211
Date Published
Unknown
Length
34 pages
Annotation
Although most of the evaluations of community crime prevention programs have used fairly primitive research designs and produced ambiguous results, the more recent evaluations are using more sophisticated and useful research designs.
Abstract
Such designs are needed to deal with the many problems affecting the internal validity of earlier studies. Four appropriate research designs are the before and after comparison, the before and after comparison with a comparison group, controlled experimentation with random assignment of the available population to target and comparison groups, and the time series study. Future evaluation studies need to focus on the relative effectiveness of various community crime prevention strategies and should try to progress beyond the current general and nonspecific knowledge in the field. Although evaluations of community crime prevention programs are expensive, policymakers need to invest resources and study these programs, particularly those which are the least expensive to replicate. Twenty-two references are listed.