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Academic Publications
Measurement in Correctional Health Research: Unique Challenges and Strategies for Enhanced Rigor
Published:
| Author: Stephanie Prost, Stephanie Kennedy, Jennifer Peck, Mary Bouchaud, Deborah Shelton
It is essential to identify valid and reliable measurement strategies to enhance accurate, comprehensive, and meaningful health assessment and evaluation to improve health outcomes among justice-involved and incarcerated populations. This article identifies and describes three primary challenges related to measurement in correctional health care and makes four recommendations for enhanced measurement rigor from a social justice perspective.
Category: Research
The Quality of Life Perception Gap in Prison Health Care Settings
Published:
| Author: Stephanie Prost, Stephen Tripodi, Jeffrey Lacasse
Peer caregivers are specially-trained incarcerated persons who support the needs of patients in correctional health care settings. Their role is of particular importance in light of the growing population of older adult prisoners with complex health problems in U.S. prisons. The purpose of the current study was to examine the disparity between patient and peer caregiver ratings of patient quality of life in a sample of correctional health dyads (n = 52) in a state prison system.
Category: Well-Being
What Trauma Looks Like for Incarcerated Men: A Study of Men’s Lifetime Trauma Exposure in Two State Prisons
Published:
| Author: Maria Morrison, Carrie Pettus-Davis, Tanya Renn, Christopher Veeh, Christopher Weatherly
While it is understood that high rates of trauma exposure are common among incarcerated male populations, there is limited data on the nature of the trauma exposure. This study examined the trauma histories of a randomly selected sample of 67 men incarcerated in the Missouri Department of Corrections. The analyses revealed several patterns among study participants, including near universal trauma exposure in adolescence with the most frequent exposures involving witnessing or being proximate to violent deaths of family and friends.
Category: Trauma
The Intersectional Effects of Race and Gender on Time to Reincarceration
Published:
| Author: Katie Ropes Berry, Stephanie Kennedy, Margaret Lloyd, Christopher Veeh, Stephen Tripodi
People of color are disproportionately incarcerated and reincarcerated after release. When compared to women, men of all races report higher rates of recidivism. However, minimal research examines the intersectional effects of race and gender on recidivism. Proportional hazards models estimated the effects of varied risk factors for Black men, White men, Black women, and White women on 8-year recidivism rates among 21,462 incarcerated Black and White men and women. Black men were incarcerated more often and more quickly when compared to all other race/gender groups.
Category: Reentry, Recidivism, Racial and Gender BIas
The Relationship Between Severe Mental Disorders and Recidivism in a Sample of Women Released from Prison.
Published:
| Author: Erin A. King, Stephen Tripodi, Christopher Veeh
Women are one of the fastest growing sectors of the prison population, and have different pathways into prison and differing needs during the reentry process when compared to men. Women report higher levels of mental health problems overall, and report more severe symptomatology. The current study focuses on the role of severe mental disorders (SMDs) for 2,311 women released from prison and how SMDs relate to recidivism. Women diagnosed with SMDs were 16% more likely to have recidivated at eight years post-release compared with women who were not diagnosed with an SMD (p < .05).
Category: Reentry, Recidivism, Mental Health, Incarcerated Women
Proposing a population-specific intervention approach to treat trauma among men during and after incarceration.
Published:
| Author: Carrie Pettus-Davis, Tanya Renn, Jeffrey Lacasse, Robert Motley
A significant treatment gap exists for incarcerated men with lifetime traumatic experiences. A small research base for trauma interventions for incarcerated women is emerging, but incarcerated men have largely been ignored. Men comprise 90% of the incarcerated population and are at the greatest risk to be rearrested for a new crime after release.
Category: Trauma, In-Prison Intervention, Reentry
The Relationship Between Interpersonal Victimization and Women’s Criminal Sentencing: A Latent Class Analysis
Published:
| Author: Stephanie Kennedy, Annelise M. Mennicke, Megan Feely, Stephen Tripodi
Latent class analysis was used to identify subgroups of incarcerated women differentiated by experiences of child abuse and intimate partner violence victimization. Four classes were extracted—Low Victimization, Child Abuse, Lifetime Physical and Psychological Abuse, and Lifetime Sexual Abuse; classes were then related to current sentence length, holding criminological predictors constant. Women in the Child Abuse and Lifetime Sexual Abuse classes had significantly longer sentences, despite the lack of significant between-class differences on criminological predictors.
Category: Incarcerated Women, Trauma, Sentencing
Promoting Reentry Well-Being: A Novel Assessment Tool for Individualized Service Assignment in Prisoner Reentry Programs
Published:
| Author: Christopher Veeh, Tanya Renn, Carrie Pettus-Davis
The Reentry Well-Being Assessment Tool (RWAT) is an innovative practice tool to systematically guide individualized assignment into reentry program services based on a participant’s changing needs during the transition from prison to the community. Clearly defined treatment targets that promote an individual’s well-being are paired with a comprehensive set of assessments within the RWAT to measure progress throughout a prisoner reentry program.
Category: Reentry, Well-Being
Incarcerated Women’s Experiences and Perceptions of Participating in Research
Published:
| Author: Lisa Schelbe, Amanda Hardwick, Ashley N. Wilfong, Cynthia E. Hanifin, Stephen Tripodi, Carrie Pettus-Davis
The research process within prisons has largely considered researchers’ perspectives. Only one known study explicitly examined incarcerated persons’ perceptions and no known studies have explored incarcerated persons’ experiences with research on sensitive topics. This study examines incarcerated women’s experiences with participating in research on victimization. A thematic analysis was conducted on responses to open-ended questions about participating in a research study from 227 women in two prisons who participated in a study about victimization.
Category: Incarcerated Women, Trauma
“Behind every woman in prison is a man”: Incarcerated Women’s Perceptions of How We Can Better Help Them in the Context of Interpersonal Victimization
Published:
| Author: Stephanie Kennedy, Annelise M. Mennicke
Although women’s rates of incarceration have increased dramatically, the criminal justice system does not meet women’s unique needs. This article used qualitative methods to describe the responses of 113 incarcerated women to the following question: How can we better help women like you? Analyses focused on women’s experiences of victimization and highlighted how to address trauma in prison reform and abolition efforts.
Category: Trauma, Incarcerated Women
Smart Decarceration: Achieving Criminal Justice Transformation in the 21st Century
Published:
| Author: Matthew Epperson, Carrie Pettus-Davis
Smart Decarceration is a forward-thinking, practical volume that provides innovative concepts and concrete strategies for ushering in an era of decarceration -- a proactive and effective undoing of the era of mass incarceration. The text grapples with tough questions and takes up the challenge of transforming America's approach to criminal justice in the 21st century.
Category: Smart Decarceration
Deterioration of Postincarceration Social Support for Emerging Adults
Published:
| Author: Carrie Pettus-Davis, Elaine Eggleston Doherty, Christopher Veeh, Christina Drymon
More than 2.5 million emerging adults (ages 18-25) are incarcerated annually and most do poorly after release. Social support after an individual’s release from incarceration is a critical protective factor against recidivism for emerging adults. However, little is known about the stability of support for emerging adults post incarceration. This study uses hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) to examine whether social support declines over time after incarceration and how change in support may vary by incarceration length.
Category: Reentry, Social Support, Emerging Adults
Correlates of HIV Risks Among Women on Probation and Parole.
Published:
| Author: Malitta Engstrom, Katherine M. Winham, Seana Golder, George E. Higgins, Tanya Renn, TK Logan
This article examines HIV risks among a sample of 406 women on probation and parole with lifetime histories of victimization who were recruited from an urban community in the southern U.S. Guided by the Comprehensive Health Seeking and Coping Paradigm, we analyze the significance of sociodemographic characteristics, substance use, posttraumatic stress disorder, and social support in relationship to three sexual risks and one drug use risk using multivariable regression.
Category: HIV/AIDS
Evaluating Seeking Safety for Women in Prison: A Randomized Controlled Trial
Published:
| Author: Stephen Tripodi, Annelise M. Mennicke, Susan McCarter, Katie Ropes Berry
This study assessed the effectiveness of Seeking Safety on depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) with incarcerated women.
Category: Incarcerated Women
Gender differences in experiences of social support among men and women releasing from prison
Published:
| Author: Carrie Pettus-Davis, Christopher Veeh, Maxine Davis, Stephen Tripodi
Positive social support is critically important to postprison well-being outcomes. However, researchers and program developers are still trying to understand how to best promote stable and sustainable social support for formerly incarcerated individuals during reentry to the community. We sought to add to the body of knowledge on social support and prisoner reentry by comparing men and women releasing from prison on the quality (e.g., positive or negative) and amount of informal social support.