‘Listen to us’ - Exploring the perceptions of young people on the impact of custody

Persistent attention on children and young people in the United Kingdom has been characterised by the growing anxiety of threatening and rebellious young people, termed by Pearson (1983) as ‘respectable fears’. This growing anxiety has resulted in expansion of the youth justice system, with emphasis on developing effective and sustainable youth offending interventions to reduce recidivism and enhance outcomes for young people (Nevill and Lumley, 2011). The process for developing effective and sustainable custodial interventions rely on output and outcome data, with limited importance placed on understanding the wider impact (e.g. education, relationships, non-cognitive skills etc.). Using an adapted sequential research design, the researcher adopted a mixed methodological approach fuelled by a desire to facilitate the active participation of young people in custody. This conference presentation disseminates findings from the semi-structured interviews conducted with young people in custody. To ensure children and young people have a voice in the youth justice process, the researcher seeks to demonstrate how the perceptions of young people on impact can be useful for organisations engaged in youth justice interventions. This paper makes an original contribution to knowledge through the identification of suitable data collection methods for identifying the wider impact of custody, specifically in Secure Training Centres.