A Proposed Prevention Intervention for Nondrug-Dependent Drug Court Clients

Abstract

A substantial body of research supports the effectiveness of drug courts in terms of reducing drug use and criminal recidivism among drug-involved offenders. However, it is unclear whether drug courts are appropriate for all clients, most notably the sizeable portion of clients who do not have a diagnosable or clinically significant substance use disorder. For these clients, drug court treatment may be ineffective or even contraindicated. Instead, best practice standards suggest that these clients would benefit from a prevention intervention designed to interrupt the acquisition of addictive behaviors. Unfortunately, such interventions have not been tested with adult offenders in drug courts. In this article, we describe a platform of cognitive and behavioral techniques that can potentially be used with nondrug-dependent drug court clients.