While nurture groups (NGs) have existed since the early 1970s and the academic literature has increasingly had interest in evaluating NGs since the 1990s, until now there has been no comprehensive review on their effectiveness. In order to contribute to current literature with an understanding of NGs' effectiveness, a comprehensive review on the previous literature was conducted between September 2013 and March 2014 by the author. This paper will present the results of the review and discusses NGs' ability to promote change in social, emotional and behavioural development (SEBD) and the key factors that contribute to NGs' effectiveness. It argues that while NGs can have a positive impact on children at least in the short term, with the available literature it is challenging to draw clear conclusions about the conditions under which nurture groups work best and further research is still required to clarify some remaining research questions.