Relationship Building Together

What does this project involve?

The programme, developed by the Trauma Recovery Academy and Bridgend Council, provides three to five days of training and support to practitioners across multiple services. Services involved include early support (e.g. Early Help Hubs and Youth Development), targeted prevention and family support (e.g. Edge of Care Services), and Youth Justice Services. Children and young people are assessed on their needs and those with lower levels of trauma are supported by trained practitioners. For those with moderate and severe trauma experiences, a multi-agency meeting is held to map trauma histories. A lead practitioner, and a clinical psychologist for severe trauma cases, lead on developing a support plan, which is monitored and adapted over time. The programme aims to better meet children and young people’s needs, improve their wellbeing, and reduce behavioural difficulties and offending.

Why did YEF fund this project?

Trauma happens when someone experiences something deeply distressing or harmful that has lasting effects on their wellbeing. Trauma-informed practice means shaping services and support in ways that recognise this impact and aim to avoid causing further harm.   

Acknowledging the impact that trauma can have and continuing to be curious about the causes of children’s behaviour is sensible. Many practitioners within the children, social and youth justice services aim to embed trauma-informed principles into their settings, policies and practices. These policies and principles may aim to shift practitioners and carers’ perspective of a child’s behaviour from ‘What is wrong with you?’ to ‘What has happened to you?’. Trauma-informed principles can also lead to the targeted support that some children may need. For instance, there is some evidence that trauma-specific therapies, which aim to support children’s recovery from trauma, can reduce children’s involvement in crime and violence. However, beyond these general principles, we know very little about how to effectively train practitioners to recognise trauma and amend their practice in response to it that can result in changes to young people’s outcomes.  

The Youth Endowment Fund (YEF) and the Home Office funded a randomised controlled trial of RBT, with practitioners, children and young people randomised to either receive the programme or business as usual. 401 children and young people entered the trial (200 intervention, 201 control), linked to 110 practitioners (56 intervention, 54 control). The evaluation aimed to establish whether RBT reduced children and young people’s offending behaviour, as measured by the Self-Report Delinquency Scale over a six months’ period. It also measured the impact on other outcomes related to children (emotional and behavioural difficulties, wellbeing, psychological health, family cohesion, police involvement, school attendance, suspensions and exclusions), and practitioners (wellbeing and attitudes to trauma-informed practice).  

The study included an implementation and process evaluation (IPE) to examine barriers and facilitators of implementation, and how both children and practitioners experienced the programme. This drew on interviews with 16 children and young people, 15 intervention delivery staff, 10 parent/carers and eight practitioners from the services involved.  

The study took place between November 2023 and September 2025. An addendum report that looks at the impact of RBT over a 12 months’ period will be published in 2027.  

97% of the children taking part in the trial were from a White ethnic background. 

Key conclusions

Relationship Building Together demonstrated a moderate positive impact on children and young people’s offending behaviour. Children linked with practitioners who received RBT self-reported lower levels of offending behaviour than children linked to practitioners who did not receive the programme. This result has a moderate security rating.

RBT showed mixed results on secondary outcomes after six months of entering the trial: it had a small positive impact on overall children’s and young people’s behaviour, peer relationships, psychological health, family conflict and school attendance; it had a moderate positive impact on children’s and young people’s emotional regulation, conduct problems, internalising behaviours, wellbeing. RBT showed a moderate negative impact on hyperactivity, prosocial behaviour, externalising behaviours, family cohesion and expressiveness and no impact on school suspensions. These are secondary outcomes and should be treated with more caution.

Practitioners viewed the training positively and felt confident applying it. They highlighted the value of multi-agency meetings and the emphasis and time on relationship building. However, some staff felt the trauma-informed approach did not differ substantially from their existing practice, involved additional workload and faced challenges with coordination across services, and that inputs from clinical psychologists were limited.

Perceptions among children and young people were mixed.  While many reported improvements in emotional regulation, insight, and personal progress, others described unmet expectations, unclear communication, and disengagement, although it is difficult to know whether this was related to RBT or to Council service delivery.

The trial involved a mixed group of children and young people, with different level of trauma and offending behaviour and it is difficult to disentangle the impact of the tiered intervention approach across this diverse group.

How secure is this evidence?

These findings have a moderate security rating. The trial was a well-designed two-armed randomised controlled trial. Attrition was quite low: 16% of children who started the trial were not included the final analysis. No significant threats to internal validity were identified. However, trials that aim to measure the impact on offending often require very large sample sizes to detect meaningful impacts and in this trial the sample size was smaller than ideal.

Should you fund or deliver RBT?

Overall, the evaluation of RBT found a moderate positive impact on children and young people’s offending behaviour. This result is positive and encouraging; children who received the programme reported less offending behaviour than those who did not. However, there are some reasons for caution. First, there was statistical uncertainty around the main finding, which means a wide range of effects are plausibly compatible with the data. Second, the secondary outcomes were mixed and did not fully support the programme theory. And third, practitioners had mixed perceptions of the programme: some felt the trauma-informed approach did not differ substantially from their existing practice.

If you are planning to deliver RBT or a similar intervention, consider the following:

• The importance of RBT’s tiered approach, which targets more intensive support to children with the greatest need.
• Ensuring there is sufficient time, buy-in and resource for effective multi-agency collaboration and input from clinical psychologists.

The evidence base remains limited on the impact of trauma-informed training and service redesign on reducing young people’s involvement in violence. While it is very sensible for practitioners and service providers to be aware of trauma, and carefully consider how to respond to the impacts of trauma among young people, service providers should think carefully and cautiously about its adoption when the primary aim is violence prevention. Other interventions with a stronger evidence base for a direct impact on violence are described in the YEF Toolkit.

What will YEF do next?

An addendum report that looks at the impact of RBT over a 12 months’ period will be published in 2027.

Download the report