Speech-Language Therapy Outcomes for Juvenile Offenders: A Systematic Review

Previous research shows a discrepancy in language abilities between youth offenders and their age matched peers, which can have negative implications during the criminal justice process. Young people with language difficulties have more adversarial police initiated contact (Winstanley et al., 2018). Youth offenders are more likely to have narrative competence deficits, which increases vulnerability during forensic interviewing (Snow and Powell, 2012). Recidivism rates are higher for youth offenders who receive intervention from work oriented programs compared to communication oriented programs (Maskin, 1976). This evidence suggests that youth offenders could greatly benefit from speech language services, but few studies examine the outcomes of intervention. The authors of this systematic review aimed to understand the existing research on speech language intervention in this population