Development and Validation of Tools for Prevention Program Outcome Evaluations
So What?
In 2022, NCITE completed a systematic review of terrorism prevention literature, which identified a need for a consistent approach to evaluating those programs. Over the past 20 years, terrorism prevention has been a point of policy emphasis for public officials at federal, state, and local levels. However, measuring the effectiveness of these programs continues to be a challenge. To address these gaps, scholars and policymakers have sought to develop assessment tools that can evaluate a wide range of prevention programs and better inform practice.
Project Summary
This project will develop and validate two instruments suitable for assessing terrorism prevention program outcomes, specifically focusing on two areas of interest – tolerance of violence and identifying concerning behaviors. Developing these assessments will lead to a deeper understanding of terrorism prevention programming outcomes and provide mechanisms for government and practitioners to evaluate terrorism prevention programs. Final deliverables for this project will include the two assessments, associated technical documentation, and implementation support tools.
Purpose/Objectives
The project will investigate two target constructs – tolerance of violence and identifying concerning behaviors – and develop tools to measure them.
Method
The research team will develop and validate conditional reasoning assessment (CRA) and situational judgment test (SJT) instruments for terrorism prevention program evaluation. CRA will assess tolerance of violence while SJT will assess the ability to identify and appropriately respond to concerning behaviors. To develop the CRA assessment tool, the research team will review sources — academic literature, manifestos, court cases, biographies, and fictional works — directly related to terrorism prevention justification mechanisms and validate this using pilot tests with college student and community member populations. To develop and validate the SJT assessment tool, researchers will engage specific subject matter experts in discussions about target indicators and validate findings by pilot testing with undergraduate students and community members.
Outputs and Impact
- Development of justification mechanisms for tolerance of violence
- Validated conditional reasoning assessment (CRA) and situational judgment test (SJT)
- Materials to support implementation of the CRA and SJT instruments
- Workshops with subject matter experts
- Final reports
Research Team
Matt Allen, Ph.D.- University of Nebraska at Omaha
- Assistant Professor of Management
- College of Business Administration
- Head of Measurement Innovation at NCITE
- Expertise: Applied research, solution implementation
- University of Nebraska at Omaha
- Associate Professor
- School of Criminology and Criminal Justice
- Head of Prevention Research Initiatives at NCITE
- Expertise: Relationship between public perceptions of terrorism and counterterrorism practices, relationship between communities and law enforcement
- North Carolina State University
- Assistant Professor
- College of Humanities and Social Sciences
- University of Nebraska at Omaha
- Graduate Research Assistant
- School of Criminology and Criminal Justice
- University of Nebraska at Omaha
- NCITE Research Specialist