Juvenile Victims in Restorative Justice: Findings from the Reintegrative Shaming Experiments

Abstract

Using a randomized experimental design the Reintegrative Shaming Experiments (RISE) showed that restorative justice (RJ) is significantly more satisfying than court for both victims and offenders. It did not, however, explore the effect of victims' age and baseline differences in the level of harm caused to victims of different crimes on outcome variables. The current study uses a two-factor ANCOVA to address these questions. Main findings suggest that whereas RJ made adults more satisfied than courts (Cohen's d=.50), conference juvenile victims were less satisfied than court juvenile victims (Cohen's d=-.28). Moreover, more serious harm is associated with decreased process satisfaction for all victims. A complementary qualitative analysis identifies adult domination and insensitivity to youth's special needs as recurring themes.