Evaluation Research and Decision Guidance: For Correctional, Addiction-Treatment, Mental Health, and Other People-Changing Agencies.

Abstract

Evaluation Research and Decision Guidance is designed help people make better judgments and decisions when trying reform, cure, or instruct anyone whose behavior or ignorance is a problem themselves or others. It will help those who work with delinquents, criminals, drug addicts, mentally ill persons, or the educationally deficient, help them become more capable, self-controlled, and law-abiding individuals. It is a to book, a guide for anyone concerned with evaluating the effectiveness of programs, predicting case outcomes, or allocating resources. Glaser analyzes all types of evaluations. He shows how define goals, measure the extent of their attainment, and assess costs in relation benefits. He distinguishes routine from non-routine decision, tells how predict outcomes more accurately in routine case prognoses, and how estimate the probable consequences of alternative choices in unusual situations that occur infrequently. A chapter by Edna Erez discusses ethical and legal issues in program evaluation. Glaser's concluding chapter deals with how institutionalize more rational policymaking. The author offers numerous examples of evaluations and decision analyses in criminal justice, addiction treatment, mental health, and educational agencies show how scientific evaluation methods have been successfully employed. Written without technical jargon, this guidebook will be essential the policymaker and the practitioner, the student and the teacher.