Diagnosing the Past, Consequences for the Future: A Life Cycle of Trauma and Mental Health Issues for Incarcerated Women. Does Race Matter?

Abstract

The last two decades have seen an increase in the literature about incarcerated women. This research has established that incarcerated women share life histories wrought with abuse and trauma. Research has also found that incarcerated women suffer from mental health issues at higher rates than the general population. This is significant to the creation of policy and programming in the criminal justice system.

Previous research in the general population has established a link between adverse experiences in childhood and negative outcomes in adulthood. Childhood adverse experiences include measures of child abuse and household dysfunction such as parental divorce and living with substance abusing parents. This study establishes a new cumulative measure of adverse experiences that spans childhood and adulthood by adding the experience of adolescent sexual assault, rape as an adult, and domestic violence to childhood adverse experiences to create a Lifetime Adverse Experience (LAE) score.

Specifically, this study is focused on life histories of adverse experiences and mental health among female prisoners. Previous studies have not looked at differences among incarcerated women by race/ethnicity. This study finds that trauma histories vary significantly between white, black, and Native American women in prison. Furthermore, lifetime adverse experiences are significantly related to entering prison with a mental health diagnosis and experiencing symptoms of depression while incarcerated. Thus creating the need for policy and programming in the criminal justice system to address these needs.