Objective: Forgiveness Therapy is proposed as a novel approach to rehabilitation for men in a maximum-security correctional institution to alleviate psychological compromises. Method:In a two-tiered study, volunteer participants within a correctional institution (N = 103) were asked to report past experiences of abuse and unjust treatment prior to their first crime and were measured on anger, anxiety, depression, hope and forgiveness. Twenty four of the most clinically compromised participants were selected from this initial assessment, with pairs first matched on certain characteristics and then randomly assigned to either experimental or control group interventions followed by a cross-over design (N = 9 in each group at the study's end). Experimental participants received 24 weeks of Forgiveness Therapy. Control group participants received 24 weeks of an alternative treatment followed by Forgiveness Therapy. Dependent variables included anger, anxiety, depression, forgiveness, hope, self-esteem and empathy.Results: Ninety percent of 103 participants reported moderate to severe abuse in childhood or adolescence. Data showed an inverse relationship between forgiveness and anger, anxiety and depression. In the Forgiveness Therapy, anger, anxiety, depression, empathy and forgiveness were statistically significant favouring both experimental groups. These results remained at the 6-month follow-up.Conclusions: Forgiveness Therapy is shown to be effective for correctional rehabilitation in healing clinical psychological compromise and in promoting positive psychological well-being in men within a maximum-security facility.

We propose a novel approach to corrections, both in maximum security prisons for adults and juvenile detention centers for adolescents. It is our hypothesis that unjust treatment from others can lead to inner pain, which can lead to anger. Unresolved anger can deepen and linger, turning to what we call excessive anger, compromising one's psychological health and behavior. Excessive anger can turn to rage (very intense, potentially violent anger) which can fuel crime, a lack of cooperation within the prison system, and increased recidivism rates. When the excessive anger is caused by unjust behavior from others, prior to a person's crime, conviction, and imprisonment, then we can reduce and even eliminate the excessive anger through the empirically-verified treatment of Forgiveness Therapy. It is rare, in our experience, for prison rehabilitation to have those in prison look backward, toward the injustices that happened to them prior to the crime. When they are given the chance to do this, they have the opportunity, perhaps for the first time, to confront the injustice and to heal from the pain and anger resulting from the unjust actions against them that might have happened years ago, even in childhood. Forgiveness Therapy may be one of the few existing mental health approaches which offer the opportunity to be free of excessive anger, perhaps for the first time in the person's life. Research on Forgiveness Therapy with an imprisoned sample of youth in Korea is described as are two individual cases of men within a maximum security facility.