Comparing and Contrasting White and African American Participants' Lived Experiences in Drug Court

Background and Purpose:  Drug courts are designed to offer treatment in lieu of incarceration for nonviolent offenders who have substance use disorders.  Recent evidence has suggested that African American participants are less likely to graduate drug court than their white counterparts.  This evidence, however, has been found mainly through quantitative methods.  Therefore, the benefits of qualitative research are not fully seen in the literature.  This study is the first to compare and contrast the experiences of white and African American participants to explore the factors that may contribute to racial disparities in graduation outcomes.  The research question for this study is:  What similarities and differences exist between white and African American participants, in regards to their views on the aspects of drug court that support them in graduating the program and the barriers they face to graduating drug court? 

Methods:  The semi-structured interviews collected data from 38 participants from a Midwestern drug court to compare and contrast white (n = 22) and African Americans (n = 16) lived experiences in the program in order to learn about the factors that may contribute to racial disparities in outcomes.  The research was guided by a phenomenological perspective.  Phenomenology is recommended when a phenomenon, like racial disparities in drug court graduation rates, exists, and developing an in-depth understanding of the phenomenon may only occur by exploring the lived experiences of the individuals impacted by the issue.  Several strategies were used to increase the rigor and validity of the qualitative findings, including observer triangulation, interdisciplinary triangulation, peer debriefing, and member checking.  The interviews were transcribed verbatim and NVivo 10 was used for the analysis.  Data were first dichotomized by race and ethnicity to compare and contrast findings.  Then, data that demonstrated consistent responses were identified as themes.    

Findings:  White participants found managing the demands of drug court with other obligations they had to be a noticeable challenge, and they also reported continued alcohol use in the program even though the program required total abstinence. African Americans were most critical about the quality of substance abuse treatment they received and felt that they were forced to accept culturally incompetent labels.  Specifically, African Americans felt that their substance abuse treatment was more like an Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) or Narcotics Anonymous (NA) meeting than counseling that was using traditional treatment methods, such as cognitive and behavioral therapies.  Furthermore, African Americans felt they were coerced to accept labels such as being an “addict” or “alcoholic”. 

Conclusion and Implications:  From a practice standpoint, enhanced drug testing methods for alcohol use, such as EtG tests, and assuring the drug courts are referring to providers that are utilizing evidence-based, culturally competent treatments, may improve graduation rates in drug courts.  Additionally, future qualitative research is suggested to gather an in-depth understanding of drug court from populations that were not interviewed in this study, such as Latinos.  Evaluating the quality of substance abuse treatment, perhaps through direct observations, may also provide additional insight into how treatment interventions are being delivered to participants.