A Modified Therapeutic Community: Reducing Violence in a Medium Security Prison

This study explores the impact a modified therapeutic community has on institutional disorder. Treatment programs are normally evaluated by their ability to prevent recidivism and relapse. This study examines the efficacy of a modified therapeutic community in reducing the number and severity of write-ups of its clients in a medium security male prison. The study describes research findings regarding the relationship between the write-ups of clients in a modified therapeutic community compared with the write-ups of inmates in a non-treatment unit. To carry out this study, the author reviewed the write-up records from the treatment program and a non-treatment unit for the period of March 2001 through October 2005. The results of this study indicated that the write-ups of the modified therapeutic community clients, as a whole, were less severe as compared to the general population clients residing in a similar dorm. They were also proportionally less specifically violent. The implication of this research for corrections administration was also discussed