A family, especially parents, plays a big role in the development of the child/adolescent. Issues associated with family can be one of the risk factors. These issues can be economic, social, etc. Also, for grandparents or other caregivers, sometimes it is challenging to pay attention and supervise these children so they do not end up in an unfavorable environment. Growing in not very favorable surroundings means that a child’s basic needs (security, love, parenting, education, moral growth, financial security) are not met. Dysfunction is usually caused by various addictions of the parents, emotional or physical absence of them or constant abuse. Such improper surroundings may push a youngster to commit a crime. 

Young people may lead down a wrong path to improve their financial conditions. When they experience poor economic conditions, they start engaging in the wrong activities. They may start selling drugs or steal things to improve their economic conditions, and this way, become juvenile delinquents.

Often, potential perpetrators are the victims of violence. Individuals may confront violence in a variety of social settings: in family, school, etc. Children who have experienced violence are most likely to have infringed relationships with adults, cannot communicate with their peers, and become “bullies” to prove themselves, sometimes they link their fate to a criminal environment.

A human being goes through several stages of social development, among which childhood and adolescence are important. Values, patterns of behavior, and motives are forming in childhood age. At this stage, family and parents play an important role in a person’s life. Further, in adolescence, people try to define their own identity, try to establish themselves, and often the influence of parents is replaced by the influence of peers and friends. Hence, the reason for juvenile delinquency can become imitation.

They can follow the example of: 1) family members who engage in criminal behavior; 2) peers prone to committing criminal acts; 3) the so-called “authorities” who push children to commit crimes.

Poor socio-economic status, indifferent attitude of parents, feelings of inferiority, lack of attention, and many other reasons can lead to various types of psychological issues in children and adolescents. For example, depression, fears, and complexes, excessive aggression, etc. This can provoke the minor to commit a crime

It is the parent’s duty to teach moral and ethical values to their children (e.g. the difference between right and wrong behavior). However, parents sometimes neglect their children and pay more focus on working hard to earn money for them or other things. In their absence, children tend to spend time with someone who pays attention to them. This way, they may also fall into wrong hands or get involved in a bad company while seeking attention from someone other than their parents. Lack of social and moral values can lead children to poor interaction with others and make them less confident. They may become selfish and arrogant, not knowing how to respect the laws.

Often lack of discourse in the family can lead children to find solace other than homes. When they are not having any communication with their parents or family members at home, they may lose unity, trust, and understanding, which can eventually lower their self-esteem or self-confidence. Once they feel they’re losing their individuality, they tend to do things they shouldn’t do to boost their self-confidence. They blindly follow their peers and adopt their unhealthy lifestyles. They shoplift and consume drugs to look cool in the eyes of their peers.

Drugs or alcohol may be exposed to child’s life by addicted parent(s) or followed examples from the criminal world.

Usually it transforms into: 1) “help” in staying disconnected from one’s emotions, as intoxication leads to temporary forgetting or total “black out”; 2) loss of control over the hidden emotions, which, in turn, show off uncontrolled (e.g. the anger suppressed and hidden appears as strong aggressiveness released in random fights or property destruction). Most of the crimes are committed while intoxicated.

It is extremely important to highlight, that dysfunctional family is not a driver to the crime itself. There are many cases known, that the experience of dysfunction in the family motivates people to creating a better life and therefore, they achieve a lot, education, stable job, healthy family, etc. But it is stated, that these good examples usually stems from people who had a chance to see a “better life”. In other words, maybe they had a relative, a teacher, another adult who (un)consciously revealed to them how the different life can be. If one did not have a chance to experience nor sneak peak or witness what is functional family, what are the values of respect, love, he/she will not know such virtues, nor he/she will understand them. Therefore, it will not become her/his life goal.

Children living on the streets, due to poor economic and social conditions, can be considered as one of the risk groups, as they are homeless children, who see “hooliganism” as the only way of their existence in most circumstances can be more linked to crime.

It is important to:

• lead activities to parents to inform them on how to raise healthy children;
• teach children about the effects of drugs, gangs, sex, and weapons; and other dangerous factors;
• lead programs to provide youths with the awareness that their actions have consequences.

As Second Chance research showed, sometimes lack of possibilities to engage in meaningful leisure activities can lead to involvement in illegal ones. Therefore, it is important to:

• Have recreation programs (that include sports, dancing, music, drama, art, and other activities) or youth/community centers that would allow youths to connect with other adults and children in the community. 
• Make these programs accessible and free of charge.

Involvement in community groups provides youth with an opportunity to interact in a safe social environment.

Lead programs that are designed to teach parenting skills to parents of children ages two to seven who exhibit major behavioral problems.

Foster safer, less hostile environment for school students at minimal cost by including anti-bullying measures (e.g. having anonymous bullying questionnaires aimed teachers/school staff to inform about the incidences).

Optimally, all juvenile detention facilities should: 

• catch youths upon their education,
• provide them with job training, 
• give them the experience of living in a safe, stable environment, 
• provide them with assistance to break harmful habits.
• help with drug rehabilitation assistance, counseling, and educational opportunities.

With a variety of non-formal education methods youth, involvement of youngsters with behavioral or criminal problems can help gain different skills, make meaningful connections, feel important and valued.

It is essential to remember that young offenders should be treated as any other group of young people, who, like ordinary teenagers, face various challenges, have their own opinions and hobbies. Most importantly, our main goal is to foster their reintegration in the society. It means that treating them in a different way can indirectly foster the idea of them being different and, accordingly, strengthen their isolation.

Also, the approach towards young offenders should be personalized within the group as much as possible, because even though they are/were brought behind the bars for similar choices in the past, it is not a homogenous group. Oppositely, it is a group of individuals who have different backgrounds, experiences and diverse personal stories. Therefore, the ability to inspire individual motivation is another demanding task for youth workers. 

When it comes to motivation, we recommend focusing on strengths of young offenders rather than on their pathological or risk characteristics. Supporting their strengths and positive habits could help with building the trust between youth workers and young offenders (which is the key action during the activities). It is also important to keep in mind that trust is a mutual process: to gain young (ex-)offender’s trust, we need to trust them too.

As reintegration is a long-distance run, the time is definitely needed. It is advisable to define the main goal of each planned activity and to think of the possible follow-up activities. Carrying out an activity once will probably bring only short-term benefits, namely, joy, pleasure and well-spent time. Continuous activities would be more likely to bring long-term individual benefits, including deeper understanding of a topic, developed social skills or bloomed positive attitudes towards oneself, peers and the world.

One of the elements that can be very useful is management of potential risks. Before the start of activity:

• make a brief analysis (the list of possible risks);
• identify ways to avoid them (if it is not possible to avoid them, think of the ways how to minimize the risks that threaten the success of the activity).

Clashes and conflicts may arise for two main reasons:

Competing: most of the activities are carried out in the competition (e.g. sports, quiz, etc.). Participants are likely to struggle with admitting and/or accepting their loss in such activities positively. Having this in mind, it makes youngsters avoid the loss as much as possible. Therefore, they are likely to use unpleasant means to win, namely, aggressiveness towards an opponent peer/team or cheating. Thus, as the facilitator of the activity, you can think of untraditional means to avoid or minimize such behaviors (e.g. skip using the usual scoreboard; skip defining winners and losers; reward youngsters/teams for playing fairly, etc.). In this way, the atmosphere of harsh competition will be softened as neither winning, nor losing would be stressed during the whole activity.

Defense (unconsciously) and/or coping (consciously) mechanisms commonly used by youngsters: some activities require young (ex-)offenders to open up, and/or can trigger their hidden experiences. That, accordingly, might make them feel uncomfortable. After appearance of painful or difficult emotions, they may isolate themselves, act aggressively and/or use rude humor. When youngster(s) start using one or several coping or defense mechanisms, a good ideas for facilitator may include: 1) accepting their behavior and making sure it is okay if they feel anger or other negative emotions; 2) if the mechanisms used by youngster(s) offends others in the activity, having a brief one-to-one conversation might help. We highly recommend trying not take anything personally, as well as remaining calm if anyone during the activity starts openly use their defense and/or coping mechanisms. Reacting negatively can make things worse and harm those already sensitive young people.

Make a grid on a piece of cardstock with some categories written in each square: “Someone who was born in winter” or “Someone who likes dancing,” or “Someone who has a brother.” Duplicate for everyone in your group and hand out pencils. Encourage the group to mix, talk to everyone to try and complete their card. If one of the items listed on the bingo card relates to the person they are talking with, have them sign their name in that box. The person, who manages to fill in all the boxes first, is the winner.

A large blanket is held up between two groups, and one player from each team stands behind the blanket. For each turn, each team chooses a volunteer to stand (or sit) behind the blanket. Count “1, 2, 3? and drop the blanket. The goal of the game is to be the first to identify the other person behind the blanket.

Ask everyone to stand and arrange the group into a circle. Ask one person to leave the room for a minute. This person will be the guesser for the round. While (s)he is gone, the group decides who will be the “leader.” This person will be the one who sets the movements for that round. When this person is chosen, invite the guesser to come back. The guesser stands in the very center of the circle. When the round begins, everyone starts swinging their arms up and down. The leader will eventually begin to do other movements (clapping, jumping up and down, etc.), and everyone else mimics the leader’s actions, without being too obvious to reveal who the leader is. 

Divide into groups of 6-10 people. Each group forms a tight circle, standing and facing each other. Everyone extends their hands into the circle and by intermingling their arms, grasps hands with other members of the group. Be sure that the two hands they are holding do not belong to the same person. The groups’ goal: untie the knot, which results in members of the group having to climb over, under, or through each other’s arms to untie the knot of bodies.

• If you were the experimenter in charge, would you have done this study? Would you have terminated it earlier?
• If you were a guard, what type of guard would you have become? How sure are you?

• If you were a prisoner, would you have been able to endure the experience? What would you have done differently than those subjects did? If you were imprisoned in a “real” prison for five years or more, could you take it?
• Do you think that kids from an urban working class environment would have broken down emotionally in the same way as did our middle-class prisoners? Why? What about women?
• Knowing what this research says about the power of prison situations to have a corrosive effect on human nature, what recommendations would you make about changing the correctional system in your country?

• What feelings of Daniel did you recognize throughout the movie? What do you think he will do next?

• What are the main challenges an ex-convict faces when trying to achieve his dreams?

• What could we do (personally, or on community level) to help an ex-convict reintegrate back to life?

• What, in your opinion, are the main stimulus for (ex-)offenders to change?

• Is the society ready to accept the ex-offenders? Are the convicts ready to return to society?

• When is the punishment being forgotten? Can it be forgotten?

• How does Papillion come to be sentenced to prison?

• How the prisoners are treated in Papillon? Is it ever justified to treat human beings that way?

• How does the violence in this movie compare to what you’ve seen in other films? How does its realistic nature affect its impact?

• What is it that makes him eventually come to decide that he does not want to escape again?

• Why is Andy sent to Shawshank? What personality traits does Andy have that contribute to his indictment? How would you have responded differently to this situation?

• What does Andy want from Red? Why do you think Red agrees to help Andy? What are some other ways Red helps Andy? How does Andy help Red? Do you think their relationship is purely transactional?

• What lesson does Andy teach his friends after getting released from solitary?

• Explain the reasons why Brooks’ found life on the outside?

• Why did Red change his speech to the parole committee the last time? Do you think he would have been freed if he hadn’t?