Abstract:Drawing on an amended version of a survey employed in three previous studies, this article reports the problems experienced by 294 male prisoners serving very long life sentences received when aged 25 or under. The broad findings are consistent with previous work, including few differences being found between the problems experienced as most and least severe by prisoners at different sentence stages. By grouping the problems into conceptual dimensions, and by drawing on interviews conducted with 126 male priso… Show more
“…In the early stages they reported missing little luxuries, heterosexual relations, and specific individuals. But by the latter stages, individuals became more isolated and emotionally detached (Frank and Gill 2015; Hulley, Crewe, and Wright 2015). Further, inmates who have grown old in prison, by virtue of the length of their initial sentence or as a result of being sentenced to prison late in life, draw attention to the problems of both psychological and physical “self maintenance” (Sykes 1958).…”
Section: Research Of Contemporary Prison Lifementioning
Inmate social organization was once a central area within criminology that stalled just as incarceration rates dramatically climbed. In this review, we return to seminal works on this topic before summarizing the changes that mass incarceration wrought in correctional contexts and the potential impacts of these changes for inmate society. We then review the few recent studies that document contemporary inmate social life and call for increased researcher-practitioner partnerships that embed criminologists within carceral settings. We suggest that network approaches are particularly useful for building on past qualitative and ethnographic insights to provide replicable results that are also easily conveyed to correctional authorities. As the era of mass incarceration peaks, we argue that the time is ripe for renewed interest in inmate society and its connections to prison stability, rehabilitation, and community reintegration.
“…In the early stages they reported missing little luxuries, heterosexual relations, and specific individuals. But by the latter stages, individuals became more isolated and emotionally detached (Frank and Gill 2015; Hulley, Crewe, and Wright 2015). Further, inmates who have grown old in prison, by virtue of the length of their initial sentence or as a result of being sentenced to prison late in life, draw attention to the problems of both psychological and physical “self maintenance” (Sykes 1958).…”
Section: Research Of Contemporary Prison Lifementioning
Inmate social organization was once a central area within criminology that stalled just as incarceration rates dramatically climbed. In this review, we return to seminal works on this topic before summarizing the changes that mass incarceration wrought in correctional contexts and the potential impacts of these changes for inmate society. We then review the few recent studies that document contemporary inmate social life and call for increased researcher-practitioner partnerships that embed criminologists within carceral settings. We suggest that network approaches are particularly useful for building on past qualitative and ethnographic insights to provide replicable results that are also easily conveyed to correctional authorities. As the era of mass incarceration peaks, we argue that the time is ripe for renewed interest in inmate society and its connections to prison stability, rehabilitation, and community reintegration.
“…In the literature of imprisonment and house arrest, problems related to deprivation of liberty and autonomy, lack of contact with other people, and feelings of tension and anxiety generated by the con nement have been studied (Payne & Gainey, 1998;Richards, 1978;Sykes, 1958). A recent study (Hulley, Crewe, & Wright, 2016) about long-term imprisonment effects showed that the deprivation of social contact is the most frequently experienced problem by inmates. Similarly, Gainey and Payne (2000) showed that people under house arrest indicated that social restrictions were also the most frequent pains and suggested that they are a form of control that eliminates social life.…”
Home confinement during the COVID-19 crisis causes problems in everyday life that can affect people's mental health. In this context, the purpose of this study was (1) to identify the most frequent problems experienced during the home confinement, (2) to analyse whether these problems vary according to socio-demographics; and (3) to study the influence of home confinement on mental health. One thousand five hundred sixty-nine participants living in Spain during the COVID-19 lockdown answered an online survey including questions about socio-demographics, problems of home confinement and mental health. We used factor analysis to group the home confinement problems into identifiable categories. Descriptive and inferential statistical methods for comparison between socio-demographics were used, and the influence of subsets of home confinement problems on mental health was analysed by multiple linear regression.The 16 evaluated problems were grouped into three factors: “Anger and Frustration”, “Deprivation of Social Contact”, and “Living Together Issues”. The most frequent problem was “missing somebody”, while “being afraid of going mad” was the least frequent one. Women, young people, people with less space at home, and teleworkers and non-working people during the lockdown period reported more home confinement problems. The Anger and Frustration factor was the one most related to mental health. These results highlighted the problems that people had to face during home confinement and their influence on mental health. Finally, the paper suggests designing specific strategies to cope with these problems according to participants’ socio-demographics.
“…This custodial reality grew progressively more resonant as most participants in this research were serving lengthy custodial sentences; harsher sanctions were imposed for gang‐related offences involving weapons throughout the UK (Hulley, Crewe and Wright ). Long‐term prisoners (LTPs) showed more efforts to desist from crime than short‐term prisoners (STPs): When you're an LTP you've more time to think don't you?…”
The article explores desistance dynamics within prison, and what gang members say about its phenomenology. Qualitative methodology was adopted with research participants in English and Scottish prisons. The findings indicate that desistance‐oriented dispositions develop gradually once gang ties, originating in the street gang, lose the resonance they once exercised on conformity to offending behaviour. This liberation from oppression means not merely that gang members are de facto left to fend for themselves, but also to find a liminal space in which to thrive. It gives them an opportunity to learn and develop prosocial values. Spirituality, a source of personal meaning, supports progression to desistance and fosters distance from the street self. Gang members’ loyalties and conflicts pre‐dating incarceration challenge the potential of prison to break criminogenic ties and foster desistance.
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