Assessment and Classification of Juvenile Offenders

Assessment and Classification of Juvenile Offenders: A Treatment Manual for Criminal Justice Practitioners guides current and aspiring criminal justice professionals through the process of assessing, classifying, and correcting delinquent and criminal behaviors exhibited by youth offenders. The text employs a medical model, leveraging scientific insight into human thought and behavior, to demonstrate how criminality and delinquency, like physical illnesses, can be treated by prompt and accurate evaluation, diagnosis, and treatment.

Over the course of 19 chapters, readers learn about offenses generally committed by youth, why they commit such offenses, and how to prevent or control criminal and delinquent behaviors. The chapters provide broader understanding of what takes place—or what should take place—in the post-adjudication and prosecution phases of youth offenders. Through the medical lens model, readers learn about the roles played by protective, risk, and needs factors; how to use classification tools to effectively assess youth offenders; the difference between legal and clinical offenders; and social, economic, and political factors that can contribute to delinquency.

Assessment and Classification of Juvenile Offenders is an ideal resource for courses in criminal justice, criminology, social work, psychology, and sociology.