Health Information Seeking and Mental Health Support Utilization Among Individuals in U.S. Prisons

Characteristics of incarcerated women's participation in groups: Exploring the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies United States prison dataset

“…Education was the primary predictor of group participation and class membership with the largest effect size, contrary to Nwakasi et al.’s (2022) finding of no main effect for education in predicting mental health group participation in a mixed sex sample. Differences may relate to sex of the participants.…”

“…Many female PMI access mental healthcare in prisons, but little is known about individual characteristics of those who participate nor the relationship of prison context variables on their participation rates. Although similar studies indicate individual characteristics and context variables may impact participation, these studies include male prisoners (Brosens et al., 2016) or limit analysis to one group intervention (Nwakasi et al., 2022), use older data (Tietjen et al., 2018), or were conducted outside the United States. (Brosens et al., 2016).…”

“…Additionally, this study exclusively explored IW's survey responses instead of the mixed sex sample used in Nwakasi et al. (2022).…”

“…Nwakasi et al. (2022) explored health information seeking and participation in mental health groups using a mixed sex U.S. prison dataset in the 2014 Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIACC; National Center for Education Statistics; NCES). They found being female, working fewer hours in prison employment, and participation in SUDs, life skills, or religious groups were positively associated with mental health group participation.…”

“…Brosens et al (2016) examined Belgian prisoner characteristics in relationship to their total participation across five different types of prison activities (sports, classes, employment training, library use, socio-cultural training courses) in a mixed sex sample, finding participation was associated with having served more time, being younger, having children, receiving visitors, and being fluent in the native language. Nwakasi et al (2022) explored health information seeking and participation in mental health groups using a mixed sex U.S. prison dataset in the 2014 Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIACC; National Center for Education Statistics; NCES). They found being female, working fewer hours in prison employment, and participation in SUDs, life skills, or religious groups were positively associated with mental health group participation.…”