Social learning theory & Family Drug Courts - APAI New …_TADCP/documents/2016/social.pdf · · 2016-04-22SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY & FAMILY DRUG COURTS ... was made famous by Ivan

SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY & FAMILY DRUG COURTS

A DISSERTATION REVIEW

CHRISTOPHER S. TAYLOR, M.A. LPC-S DOCTORAL CANDIDATE, CAPELLA UNIVERSITY COURT COORDINATOR, LEGACY FAMILY DRUG COURT


WHY DRUG COURTS?

FAMILY DRUG COURTS ARE UNIQUE

SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY

DISSERTATION STUDY

DRUG COURTS


HISTORY OF DRUG COURTS

▸ The first drug court was founded in 1989 in Maim/Dade County, Florida.

▸ In response to the massive overcrowding of prisons as a direct result of the war on drugs launched in the mid 1970’s (Stinchcomb, 2010).

▸ According to the Bureau of Justice Assistance (2003), drug courts were developed as specialty courts with specific dockets or calendars with the direct purpose of reducing the recidivism of substance abusing non-violent offenders who were convicted of a crime while abusing drugs or alcohol.



▸ Drug courts were developed to work closely with community treatment professional to offer supervised drug and alcohol treatment, regular drug testing, community support and the use of rewards and sanctions to aid in successful drug rehabilitation and increase the probability of long term sobriety (Bureau of Justice Assistance, 2003).

▸ The governing idea of drug courts is simple, treatment for drug and alcohol abuse to reduce recidivism rather than automatic punishment for the crime that only results in overcrowded prisons and high recidivism



▸ Since 1989, the drug court movement has seen massive development with exponential growth and expansion.

▸ As a true grassroots movement, drug courts have begun to spring up throughout the United States and the international judicial community as a whole

▸ By December, 2007, fully operational drug courts numbered above 2,100 throughout all fifty states with an additional 280 more in the planning phases (Office of Drug Control Policy, 2008).



▸ Governing bodies such as the National Association of Drug Court Professional (NADCP) along with state and foreign entities have been developed to aid in the regulation and organization of drug courts throughout the world.

▸ Following the establishment of Canada’s first drug court and the first drug court outside of the United States, there has been a wellspring of drug courts developing a global community.



▸ In the 24 years following the inception of the first drug court program, research has primarily focused on the effectiveness and success of drug court programs over all other forms of criminal correctional programs (NADCP, 2013).

▸ According to the National Association of Drug Court Professionals, the research indicates that drug courts “significantly reduce drug abuse and crime and do so at far less expense than any other justice strategy” (p. vi).


HISTORY OF DRUG COURTS: VARIETY

▸ Following the success of drug court programs, not only nation wide, but world wide as well, there are now over 2,700 drug courts in existence (NADCP, 2013).

▸ Among populations such as DWI offenders, veterans, prostitutes and families affected by drug and alcohol abuse there exists a large need of treatment beyond the traditional crime and punishment model (NADCP, 2013).

▸ While criminal drug courts make up the largest population among drug courts, new courts have been established to assist in areas such as family law, DWI cases, prostitution courts and courts specific to the veteran population (NADCP, 2013).


HISTORY OF FAMILY DRUG COURTS

▸ Family drug courts are unique in that they service parents, primarily women, who have had their children removed from their care by local child welfare systems due to drug or alcohol abuse.

▸ Parents who qualify for family drug court programs have experienced the devastating affects of addiction as they watch their children being placed into foster care due to their struggle with addiction.



▸ Tragically, it is not surprising to see the high relation of drug dependent parents to child welfare cases with upwards to 80% of drug dependent parents having children in the welfare system (Dakof et al., 2010).

▸ Drug dependent parents often see their parental rights terminated and their children placed into an overcrowded and underfunded foster system (Dakof et al., 2010).

▸ Much like criminal courts, parents quickly reoffend after their rights have been terminated by continuing to use drugs and alcohol to cope with long-term social, mental and economic issues.

▸ Further, these parents often see an increase in child welfare referrals with future pregnancies as well as placement instability for their children resulting maladaptive behaviors in the children often leading to drug and alcohol abuse in their later life.



▸ With strong judicial and community support family drug courts have been established through out the United States with just over 250 family drug courts in operation in 2009 (Bureau of Justice Assistance, Drug Court Clearinghouse, 2009).

▸ Similar to criminal drug courts, family drug courts suffer from a lack of empirical research in program effectiveness, diverse program populations and nonrandom designs (Dakof et al., 2009).

▸ In addition to major research limitations family drug courts also suffer from a lack of conformity with no clear governing guidelines, best practices or standardized procedures making it difficult to determine how successful these programs truly are and limiting the ability to replicate their success (Dakof et al., 2010).


WHAT MAKES FAMILY DRUG COURTS DIFFERENT?

▸ There is a high link of drug abuse to child welfare intervention, especially in that young mothers have a difficult time maintaining sobriety due to various social issues.

▸ Not only do we have the drug court participant to consider but there is a child or children to consider as well.

▸ CPS and other organizations are highly active in family drug court programs.

▸ The child is often the parents primary motivator to achieve sobriety.

▸ Unlike criminal courts, family courts are unable to issue jail time.

CLASSICAL & OPERATE CONDITIONING

HOW DID WE GET HERE?


CLASSICAL CONDITIONING: STIMULI

▸ Focused on behavioral conditioning through conditioned responses, classical conditioning, also known as respondent conditioning, was made famous by Ivan Pavlov (Harris, Patterson, & Gharaei, 2015; Troisi, 2013).

▸ Pavlovian Dog experiment (Pavlov, 1927).


CLASSICAL CONDITIONING: STIMULI

▸ Regularly utilized in many mental health and drug treatment settings, classical conditioning is a powerful tool in altering the individual’s rewards system (Bryant, Roberts, Culbertson, Le, Evans, & Fanselow, 2009).

▸ Drugs = Bad : Sobriety = Good

▸ However, In regards to human capital and the environment of drug and alcohol use, no amount of behavioral or cognitive conditioning is enough to break the vicious cycle of drug use (May, 2008).


OPERATE CONDITIONING: CONSEQUENCE

▸ Similar to classical conditioning, operant conditioning or instrumental conditioning is a form of behavioral learning (Skinner, 1938; Troisi, 2013).

▸ Whereas classical conditioning focuses on response to stimuli, operant conditioning focuses on response to consequences (Skinner, 1938; Troisi, 2013).

▸ Punishment decreases behavior and rewards increase behavior.


OPERATE CONDITIONING: CONSEQUENCE

▸ Prize-based rewards focus on teaching the subject new desirable behaviors while altering the rewards system in the brain have become a growing part of mental-health treatment.

▸ While this approach has garnered some success in the field of drug treatment it has shown little success in reducing recidivism and long term drug abuse (Silverman, Roll, & Higgins, 2008; Troisi, 2013).


CLASSICAL & OPERATE CONDITIONING

▸ Behavioral and cognitive learning alone are not enough to instill long term change.

▸ The social aspect of learning is disregarded in both classical and operant conditioning theories and as such the subject is left to develop their own definitions and models of healthy behavior when they reenter society from either treatment or incarnation (May 2008).

SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY


SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY: BANDURA

▸ Developed by Albert Bandura (1977, 1986).

▸ A response to other theories of learning such as classical and operant conditioning to account for language acquisition and other novel social behaviors.

▸ Learning is not only behavioral, but a social and cognitive process as well.

▸ Learning occurs when behavior is directly observed or the consequence of that behavior is observed.


SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY: 5 CORE CONCEPTS

▸ Learning is not simply behavioral; it is a cognitive and social process.

▸ Learning occurs when a behavior or consequences of behavior is observed.

▸ Learning involves extraction of information from those observations, and making decisions about the performance of the behavior. Learning can occur without an observable change in behavior.

▸ Learning is not entirely dependent on reinforcement.

▸ Learning occurs through reciprocal determinism (Cognition, environment, and behavior all mutually influence each other). The learner is not a passive recipient of information.


SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY: 4 PROCESSES TO AFFECT CHANGE

▸ Attention & Retention:

The cognitive processes of attention and retention center around the observer’s ability to perceive and observe (attention) a specific behavior as well as their ability to remember and retain (retention) this behavior

▸ Reproduction & Motivation:

Likewise, the behavioral processes of reproduction and motivation are dependent of the observer’s ability to model the desired behavior (reproduction) and their desire (motivation) to model the behavior.

BOBO DOLL EXPERIMENT


SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY: AKERS

▸ Akers (1973, 1998, 2001) integrates the tenets of Social Learning Theory with Sutherland’s (1947) concepts of differential association.

▸ Four principles of Social Learning Theory:

▸ differential association

▸ differential reinforcement

▸ modeling

▸ definitions


SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY: FOUR PRINCIPLES

▸ Differential association refers to the idea that individuals will associate behaviors they directly observer or indirectly observe via consequences of that behavior and are then more likely to approve of and adopt these behaviors.

▸ Definitions are behaviors that are learned behavioral stimuli based on the individual’s interpretation of the observed behavior.


SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY: FOUR PRINCIPLES

▸ Modeling or imitation is defined as the behavior of the individual reflecting the anticipation of believed rewards and punishments, which are learned by modeling or imitating observed behavior in the environment

▸ Differential reinforcement builds on the idea of differential association by creating a reinforcement of behaviors via “the balance of anticipated or actual rewards and punishments that follow or are consequences of behavior”

SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY HAS BECOME ONE OF THE MOST WIDELY USED THEORIES TO UNDERSTAND BEHAVIORAL CHANGE AND LEARNING IN CRIMINAL AND DEVIANT BEHAVIOR. Pratt et al. 2010

SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY & FAMILY DRUG COURTSTEXT

BRIDGING THE GAP: SLT & DRUG COURTS

▸ While Social Learning Theory is a widely accepted theory, there is little research into its application for drug court programs (DeVall, Gregory, & Hartmann, 2012).

▸ It seems this lack of research is due to the infancy of drug court programs as they continue to develop in response to a maladaptive judicial system focused on harsher punishments and longer sentences (DeVall, Gregory, & Hartmann, 2012).


BRIDGING THE GAP: SLT & DRUG COURTS

▸ As the participant advances through the drug court program, their behavior is modified by the four constructs of Social Learning Theory.

▸ The drug court participant will shift their anticipation of actual rewards and punishments from that of a criminal and deviant-focused mindset to a model that more accurately reflects true consequences of their behavior by learning new definitions of healthy behavior and modeling that behavior in the family drug court program.


BRIDGING THE GAP: DRUG COURTS AS SOCIAL CAPITAL

▸ Social Learning Theory allows for a deeper understanding of how the drug court participant is able to modify their negative behavior through learning new healthy behaviors by observing these behaviors in the social setting of treatment and regular court hearings, and through reinforcement via drug testing, program phase advancement and graduation from the program (May, 2008).

▸ Drug courts work to facilitate change among their participants by developing change in their environment through prosocial behavior.

DISSERTATION STUDY


DISSERTATION STUDY

▸ A study of the differences between completers and non-complete of family drug court programs.

▸ By evaluating the differences between completers and non-completers on number of court appearances and drug screening, number of days in treatment, and the participants’ ability to graduate from these programs, family drug court professionals will be able to increase the effectiveness of their programs through the development of empirically sound policies and procedures.


DISSERTATION STUDY: VARIABLES

▸ One dependent variable: program completion

▸ Three dependent variables: number of days in treatment, number of positive drug screens and frequency of court appearances over the past two years


DISSERTATION STUDY: VARIABLES

▸ Program Completion - Success

▸ Drug Screens - Sobriety

▸ Court Appearance - Attendance

▸ Treatment - Substance abuse treatment

▸ Differential Reinforcement

▸ Modeling

▸ Differential Association

▸ Definitions


METHODOLOGY

▸ Quasi-experimental, ex post facto design

▸ To explore the statistical significance between groups of completers (individuals who complete a family drug court program) groups of non-completers (individuals who failed to complete a family drug court program).

▸ Archival data over the past two years


POPULATION

▸ 12 Family drug court populations in the Southwestern United States have been identified for participation in this study.

▸ One program was disqualified for the study due to a conflict of interest.

▸ One program was dissolved.

▸ One program never responded.

▸ Two programs declined to participate due to manpower issues.

▸ Seven programs have a greed to participate.


LIMITATIONS IN RESEARCH

▸ Lack of a control group

▸ Appropriate funding for family drug court programs

▸ Lack of manpower

▸ Lack of national standards to help organize and collect data


EXPECTED FINDINGS

▸ It is believed that participants that submit for more drug screens will have a higher completion rate than those that submit for less drug screens

▸ It is believed that participants who attend more court hearings than those that attend less will have a higher completion rate.

▸ It is believed that participants who spend more time in substance abuse treatment will have a higher completion rate than those that spend less time in substance abuse treatment.

▸ It is believed that these results will support the use of Social Learning Theory as predominate guiding theory for family drug courts.


REFERENCES

▸ Akers, R. L. (1973). Deviant behavior: A social learning approach. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

▸ Akers, R. L. (1998). Social learning and social structure: A general theory of crime and deviance. Boston: Northeastern University Press.

▸ Akers, R. L. (2001). Social learning theory. In R. Paternoster & R. Bachman (Eds.), Explaining criminals and crime: Essays in contemporary criminological theory (pp. 192–210). Los Angeles, CA: Roxbury.

▸ Bandura, Albert. (1977). Social learning theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

▸ Bandura, Albert. (1986). Social foundations of thought and action: A social cognitive theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.


REFERENCES

▸ Brauer, J. R., & Tittle, C. R. (2012). Social learning theory and human reinforcement. Sociological Spectrum, 32(2), 157-177.

▸ Bryant, C. D., Roberts, K. W., Culbertson, C. S., Le, A., Evans, C, J., & Fanselow, M. S. (2009). Pavlovian conditioning of multiple opioid-like responses in mice, Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 103(1–2), 74-83.

▸ Dakof, G. A., Cohen, J. B., Henderson, C. E., Duarte, E., Boustani, M., Blackburn, A., Venzer, E., & Hawes, S. (2010). A Randomized pilot study of the Engaging Moms Program for family drug courts. Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment, 38, 263-274.

▸ DeVall, K. E., Gregory, P. D., & Hartmann, D. J. (2012). The potential of social science theory for the evaluation and improvement of drug courts. Journal of Drug Issues, 42(4), 320-336.

▸ Harris, J. A., Patterson, A. E., & Gharaei, S. (2015). Pavlovian conditioning and cumulative reinforcement rate. Journal Of Experimental Psychology: Animal Learning And Cognition, 41(2), 137-151.


REFERENCES

▸ May, C. K. (2008). Drug courts: A social capital perspective. Sociological Inquiry, 78(4), 513-535.

▸ National Association of Drug Court Professionals (2013). Adult Drug Court Best Practice Standards Volume I. Alexandrea, Virgina.

▸ National Association of Drug Court Professionals (1997). Defining drug courts: The key components (NCJ No. 205621). Washington, DC: Author.

▸ Pavlov, I. P. (1927). Conditioned reflexes: An investigation of the physiological activity of the cerebral cortex (N.York, Trans.). Dover, DE: G. V. Anrep.

▸ Skinner, B. F. (1938). The behavior of organisms: an experimental analysis. Oxford, England: Appleton-Century, 1938.


REFERENCES

▸ Silverman, K., Roll, J. M., & Higgins, S. T. (2008). Introduction to The Special Issue on The Behavior Analysis and Treatment of Drug Addiction. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 41(4), 471–480.

▸ Stinchcomb, J. (2010). Drug courts: Conceptual foundation, empirical findings, and policy implications. Drugs: education, prevention and policy. 17(2), 148-167.

▸ Troisi, Joseph R. (2013). Perhaps more consideration of pavlovian-operant interaction may improve the clinical efficacy of behaviorally based drug treatment programs. The Psychological Record, 63(4), 863-893.

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Social learning theory & Family Drug Courts - APAI New …_TADCP/documents/2016/social.pdf · · 2016-04-22SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY & FAMILY DRUG COURTS ... was made famous by Ivan