Benefits and costs of prevention programs for youth: technical appendix

Abstract

This technical appendix describes the methodology used to estimate the benefits and costs of prevention and early intervention programs, as directed by the Washington State Legislature in 2003. It examines seven outcomes of interest to the Legislature: reducing crime, lowering substance abuse, improving education, decreasing teen pregnancy and births, reducing teen suicide attempts, lowering child abuse and neglect, and reducing domestic violence. The authors present a model that estimates long-run benefits and costs, striving for internal consistency in making cautious assumptions. They also employ meta-analytic procedures to determine the effectiveness of prevention and early intervention programs, making adjustments for research design quality, “real world” application, and the quality of outcome measures used in studies. – AI-generated abstract