Meta-Analysis of Moral Reconation Therapy® Recidivism Results From Probation

Summary—A meta-analysis of nine published outcome studies detailing the effects of Moral Reconation Therapy on recidivism in parolees and probationers is presented. The studies included in the meta-analysis had a total of 2,460 MRT-treated individuals and 7,679 individuals in control groups. Only one of the studies included in this report had any affiliation with the developers of MRT. A statistically significant reduction in recidivism, defined as rearrests or reincarcerations, was found (p =.00006) with a transformed effect size of.2238. The results are consistent with a prior meta-analysis on MRT recidivism outcomes with incarcerated felons. Meta-analysis has rapidly become the standard to assess the effectiveness of various forms of treatment (Smith, Glass, & Miller, 1980). Meta-analysis is a method of mathematically combining outcome results from different studies to assess the overall effectiveness of a treatment approach upon dependent variables. The statistical approach is especially useful when various research studies use different dependent variables and different time frames. For example, in criminal justice outcome research, the ter