Mental Health Courts: A Meta-Content Analysis

• In Event: Poster Session II

Abstract

Mental Health Courts (MHCs) are a type of problem-solving court that originated in response to the disproportionately high rates of individuals with mental illnesses involved in the criminal justice system. As part of a larger Master thesis project that will focus on the experience of female defendants in MHCs, the present paper represents an initial section, consisting of a meta-content analysis of the current body of research on these diversion courts. Using ATLAS.ti, a Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software (CAQDAS), we set out to identify what are the most widely used concepts, variables, and/or methodologies employed when studying MHCs, and what their efficacy is in the study of this program. The results showed that recidivism is the main measure variable used in evaluating these interventions, and that significantly more attention is placed on individual pre-MHC factors participants bring in with them to treatment (offense type, socio-demographic variables, mental health and substance use status, criminal history) over in-MHC (treatment, participant behavior, process factors, MHC completion status) and post-MHC (recidivism, mental health outcome, substance use outcome) involvement elements. Possible paths for future studies and methodologies are also considered and discussed.

Author

• Irina Fanarraga, St. John's University