APPA is Recruiting Research Partners for the IDA

In 2013, the American Probation and Parole Association (APPA), with support from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), completed initial validation of the Impaired Driving Assessment (IDA) with a normative sample of 948 offenders sentenced to probation for a driving while impaired (DWI) offense. The IDA is a differential screening instrument which consists of 45 items across two components designed to estimate the risk for future impaired driving, provide preliminary guidelines for service needs, estimate the level of responsivity to supervision and services, and identify the degree to which traffic safety has been jeopardized among individuals convicted of a DWI offense.

The IDA is intended for wide use across multiple jurisdictions and with diverse populations involved with the justice system. APPA is interested in conducting further research to evaluate the IDA’s performance in order to answer these questions, among others:

• What is the predictive validity of the IDA for new impaired-driving arrests, exclusively, across multiple jurisdictions?
• Do certain items on the IDA have more statistical power than others in predicting recidivism?
• Are there differences between males and females in terms of risk and needs the IDA should consider?
• Should additional factors be taken into consideration for non-alcohol impaired-driving offenses?
• How well does the IDA perform compared to general risk assessments in identifying clients most suitable for specialty court programs?

Agencies with staff members who have undergone the proper training and have resolved any technical issues related to using the IDA are eligible to work with APPA on individual research studies.

For questions, please email Megan Foster or call 859-244-8236.