Child And Youth Survey : The And Nichols Was A Longitudinal Study Design Using Data From High School Essay

Approximately 80% of incarcerated women are mothers (Mapson, 2013). On average, the adult female offender is between the ages of 25 and 29. Historically, incarcerated women live with their children prior to incarceration and are the sole financial support for those children. When a mother is incarcerated over 80% live with relatives (mostly maternal grandparents) and about 20% live in foster care. Due to mothers being placed far from populated centers, more than half of mothers will not see their children while they are imprisoned. Women rarely see their children due to the child being in foster care or with family members that do not have the financial resources to travel for visits.

The United States’ ever-expanding prison and jail population has brought about many questions regarding the side-effects of mass incarceration, namely involving the effects on the children and families from which those incarcerated are removed. Regardless of the perspectives on the appropriate position of incarceration in the criminal justice system, imprisonment disrupts many positive and nurturing relationships between parents and their children. In fact, more than 1.7 million children have a parent who is incarcerated in a state or federal prison as of 2007 (Glaze & Maruschak, 2008). These youths are at risk for developing behavior and school problems in addition to insecure attachment relationships. Parental incarceration, which may also be coupled with economic disadvantage and inconsistent living arrangements (Geller, Garfinkel, Cooper, & Mincy, 2009) can be an extremely difficult experience for children. It should come as no surprise that families with children suffer economic strain and instability when a parent is imprisoned, considering how each parent in today’s world typically needs to set aside time to earn an income to support their family, and most are unable to support their homes on one income. While it may be considered intrusive to some to intervene in the lives of children and families with incarcerated parents, research has suggested that there are positive societal benefits to intervening in the lives of incarcerated parents and their

Being the child of an incarcerated parent has substantial amounts of negative influences on youth today. As young children, many consider their parents as role models. Someone who they can confide in, someone who will preserve them, and someone who will guide them through life. For most youngsters having an incarcerated parent, means that their admirable example in life is absent. Not having a parent present in one's childhood leads to innumerable negative outcomes and impacts.

We know much more about incarcerated mothers than we know about incarcerated fathers. For example, over 70% of female inmates are mothers of dependent children under the age of eighteen. Almost 90% of incarcerated females are single parents and heads of households. According to some estimates, a quarter of a million children are separated from their parents each year by jail and prison (Glick & Neto, 1977; McGowan & Blumenthal, 1978; McPeek & Tse, 1988; U.S. Department of Justice, 1992). We do not have this kind of information about incarcerated fathers. The lack of statistics concerning fathers in prison may suggest that they are a forgotten group.

Over the last half-century, the United States has turned more and more frequently to the use of incarceration as a form of punishment. Sentencing policies and stricter laws requiring mandatory minimums for certain offenses, no matter the conditions of the offense, have boosted the incarceration rate in this country to staggering heights. The typical issues that affect America’s prison systems are reflected in Jennifer Gonnerman’s book, Life on the Outside: The Prison Odyssey of Elaine Bartlett. Elaine Bartlett’s life, along with the lives of surrounding family and friends, is forever changed by her 16 years of incarceration. Elaine Bartlett is only one of many Americans that have been wronged by the cruel and unusual punishments implemented by a society claiming to have a fair, balanced, and equal justice system. A fair and balanced justice system that convicts people who carries the right amount of drugs in weight to have a mandatory incarceration for a minimum of 15 years to life, yet those who commit murder or rape may receive a lesser sentence. There is also the issue of transitioning back into society after being incarcerated for so many years. Incarceration does not just punish the offender; the offender’s family and friends are also negatively affected by the conviction and imprisonment of a loved one. Children could be put in the system or need to be raised by other members in the family. This could lead the children to deviate down the same path as their parent who

Since 1970 the rate of incarceration has more than tripled in the United States alone. In may urban cities such as Washington D.C., it has increased five fold. But statistics do not reveal what it is like for the children, wives, and parents of prisoners. It certainly does not show how the increasing numbers of inmates on the inside are having a profound effect on the outside--reaching deep into the family and community life of urban american families. Drawing on numerous powerful family structures supported by extensive empirical data, studies are shining a light on the darker side of a system that is failing the very people it is designed to protect.

Some of the children become dependent on the government sustenance. Incarcerated women often find that their actions hurt their family “especially of women, destroys the family network. When the men got to prison, potential role models are lost. When women go to prison, families most often fall apart” (Hotelling) while in an institution they might never see their children. As statistics continuously provides that children lived with and cared for by their

“Prisoners earn little while incarcerated and even after release, men with a history of incarceration face structural and social barriers to employment. Many are unable to find stable and well-paying work even long after their release” (Geller et all., 2009). Low-earning parents tend to live in poorer neighborhoods. These neighborhoods often have poorer schools within them which directly affect a child’s academic success. However, researchers agree that adding an incarcerated parent to this equation intensifies the negative effect their children experience with academics.

The author attempts to glide over the emotional health and well being and the extent to which the child will be affected by parental incarceration. Most children with incarcerated parents experiance a broad range of emotions, including fear, anxiety, anger, sadness,loneliness, and guilt (The Osborne Association 1993). They may also act out inapproperiately, become disruptive in the classroom or engage in other anti sociol behaviors. Often, their academic performance deteriorates and they develop other school related difficulties. The emotional and behavioral difficulties have been linked to a variety of factors, including parent child seperation and social stigma which the author fails to discuss. The book did not contributed to my understanding of the scope of the problem of parental incarceration and the effects on the children. However reviewing existing literature, though scarce re interated my hypothesis that children of incarcerated parents experience a variety of negative consequences. Nature of the parents, crime, length of sentence, availability of family support or all important factors to be considered affecting these children.

The number of women in prison has substantially increased over the last several decades, with a 60 percent rise worldwide. This phenomena is especially apparent in the United States of America, with some states recording rises up to 400 percent over the last thirty years. Despite women only representing 7 percent of the prison population, their incarceration has a major impact on society. With the majority of women in prison being mothers, over one million U.S children are said to be directly affected by these statistics. It is widely recognized that incarcerated mothers and their children represent a high-risk group. Many incarcerated women have or still are experiencing a number of difficulties that may directly or indirectly impact their

How beneficial or detrimental is the effects of parenting from the penal system for the children and families involved? How much of an influence is the effects of parenting from the penal system is affecting the child’s developmental skills? Is parenting from the penal system, exposing the children to the risk factors that may increase the chances of them being incarcerated? These are the typical questions and concerns that are being questioned when researchers are gathering their conclusion.

Even though mothers in prison represent only 8.1% of all incarcerated parents, the actual numbers are shocking at 65,600 by 2007 mid-year (Glaze and Maruschak, 2010). This number has doubled (122%) during the previous 16 years and the number of children affected have increased by 131% to 147,400. In addition, the rate of increase in incarcerated mothers was twice that of incarcerated fathers during the same period. Race is also a significant factor, with children of African American and Hispanic parents being 8.9 and 3 times, respectively, more likely to have an incarcerated parent than White children (The Sentencing Project, 2007). This essay will examine prison policies surrounding incarcerated women in U.S. prisons, including those in the state of Mississippi.

In reading and dissecting Nell Bernstein’s All alone in the world: Children of the incarcerated, many social issues and issues within current policies involving the incarcerated population were discussed. It is no secret that for some time now, the United States’ criminal justice system has been majorly flawed in more ways than one. Bernstein focuses and creates conversation around several difficulties that children of the incarcerated population experience. The central social problem presented in Bernstein’s novel is that children are being separated from their parents at crucial developmental stages in their lives. Many of the children experienced their parent(s) being incarcerated at very young ages; ages where having a parent to interact with on a daily basis is imperative, not only for developmental growth, but for emotional and social aspects as well. At these young ages, children are unable to understand and process what exactly is occurring and more importantly why their parents are being taken away from them.

Juvenile delinquency is of great concern in the United States. In 2007 over 2 million arrests were juveniles. There are two types of juvenile delinquency. The first type of offense is a behavior that would be a criminal violation for an adult. The other offense is called a “status” offense. Status offenses are delinquent actions that do not apply to adults, like running away and truancy. This paper will discuss the impact of gender and family on delinquency and the treatment by gender in the juvenile justice system.

More and more women-mothers, grandmothers, wives, daughters, and sisters are doing hard prison time all across the United States. Many of them are facing the prospect of years, decades, even lifetimes behind bars. Oddly, there’s been little public discussion about the dramatic increase of women in the prison system. What exactly is happening here, and why?