what is the difference between criminogenic needs and responsivity well with the prison population increasing and over 70% of countries worldwide governments have increasingly turned their attention to the issue of reoffending also known as recidivism although many evidence-based models have been put forth over the years to reduce recidivism rates there's little question that the most dominant is what is currently referred to as the risk need responsivity or RN our model the RN our model has three underlying principles first is the risk principle the idea here is to identify offenders at highest risk of recidivism and prioritize interventions for them in other words treat the people who need it most in order to reduce recidivism second is the criminogenic deeds principle the idea here is to identify the risk factors that are most likely to lead to acts of recidivism and use them as treatment targets for example if there are two offenders convicted of domestic violence one who only harmed his wife when drunk and the other who harmed his wife regardless of whether he was intoxicated or not substance use treatment should arguably be prioritized for the first man but perhaps not the second in other words rather than treating just any risk factor prioritized treatment for risk factors most likely causally linked with recidivism and finally there is the responsivity principle the idea here is to identify the unique personality and learning characteristics of the offender being evaluated and make sure that those characteristics are respected during treatment for example let's say we're working in a correctional where there are two forms of anger-management treatment being offered the first is one-on-one with a case manager and the other is group based now say we have a new offender enter the facility who's quite shy and introverted it would make sense that they would do better in a one-on-one setting then if asked to open up or share with the group in other words they would be more responsive so make sure to tailor treatments to the individual client we think Richard for his question and invites you to send us your own questions to services at guy Frank calm now a critical part of identifying offenders at high risk of recidivism and treatment targets to reduce that risk is the use of evidence base for risk assessment tools there currently over 400 risk assessment tools out there and given the nuances between jurisdictions deciding which is the perfect fit for you can be a time intensive and quite costly challenging but luckily there's now a solution the global institute of forensic researches risk assessment tool selection service after a detailed interview with your administrators and staff to establish your exact needs our team of risk assessment specialists comprehensively search our database of these over 400 tools and find that with the best goodness of fit in other words we find the instrument that will produce the highest rates of accuracy for you for more information and a free consultation call or email us today thank you for your time and we look forward to hearing from you shortly