A Home Office-funded study into tackling radicalisation among young people has concluded that the approach being pushed through by the home secretary, Priti Patel, is so flawed that it is “madness”.Instead the research, which will be unveiled on Wednesday and is described as one of the biggest scientific surveys of its type in Europe, found that the most effective strategy was precisely the opposite approach pursued by Patel. Generating “positive psychology” among young people was found to be significantly more effective than punitive policies when challenging “violent youth radicalisation”, defined as gang crime through to the development of extreme ideologies.