A Study of Adult Probation Violation Rates by Means of the Cohort Approach

Abstract

parole from state correctional institutions. While it has been generally recognized that recidivism, as one measure of the effectiveness of a rehabilitation program, could be applied to probation as well as parole, its application to this field has been very limited. One reason for this is the decentralized nature of probation services. In most states, one agency handles all defendants released on parole from state penal institutions, while probation is usually administered by the individual counties. Many of these counties simply do not have the necessary funds or staff to set up the statistical controls that are needed to study the factors that contribute to success or failure on probation. While it is true that some of the larger counties in each state do have statistical controls that would permit a study of violation rates, the data are seldom used for these purposes. Also, because of the decentralization just mentioned, there has been little impetus for developing uniform criteria of what is a successful or unsuccessful case. The criteria used in parole recidivism studies are not uniformly applicable to the field of probation in that recidivism must be viewed in light of the program under study. The level of conduct expected of a misdemeanant, or a probationer with no extensive criminal record, may be quite different from the level of conduct expected of a felon released on parole from a state correctional institution. The problem then is what methods can be employed to bring probation data together from many different jurisdictions so that uniform criteria can be adopted for measuring recidivism. It would seem that the task of gathering uniform data, making consistent interpretations, and establishing criteria for a study of recidivism should fall to a