Unmet Mental Health Needs of Jailed Parents With Young Children

• Published date: 01 February 2021
• Author: Zoe Milavetz,Kaitlyn Pritzl,Luke Muentner,Julie Poehlmann‐Tynan
• Date: 01 February 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12525

Z M, K P, L M,  J P-T

University of Wisconsin–Madison

Unmet Mental Health Needs of Jailed Parents With

Young Children

Objective: Mental health symptoms in jailed

parents with young children were examined

in relation to gender, race, trauma, parenting

stress, and supports.

Background: Most U.S. incarcerationoccurs in

jails, which are notorious for high rates of men-

tal illness. Jail incarceration is a signicant

stressor for families because most incarcerated

individuals are parents.

Method: The sample included 165 jailed par-

ents with children (aged 2–6years) who com-

pleted an interview and questionnaires. Rela-

tive risk analyses determined symptom severity,

and multivariate analysis of variance tested dif-

ferences in White and non-White mothers and

fathers. Ordinary least squaresregression exam-

ined predictors of mental health symptoms.

Results: Depression and thought problems

(hallucinations, strange thoughts, self-harm)

were the most common problems. Jailed

mothers reported more depression, anxiety,

attention-decit/hyperactivity disorder, and

drug abuse than fathers. Childhood physical

abuse and parenting stress were associated with

more symptoms, whereas family support related

to fewer symptoms.

Conclusion: Jailed parents experienced 3 to

5 times the odds of symptoms compared with

Human Development and Family Studies Department, Uni-

versity of Wisconsin,1300 Linden Drive, Madison WI 53706

(julie.poehlmanntynan@wisc.edu).

Key Words: depression, incarcerated parents, jail, mental

health, parenting stress, trauma-informed services.

norms, with a high rate of comorbidities relative

to the low proportion of parents who received

any mental health treatment.

Implications: Mental health interventions

for jailed parents are needed, especially

gender-responsive, trauma-informed services

that decrease parentingstress and foster positive

family connections.

The United States incarcerates more people than

any other country in the world, with most incar-

ceration occurring in jails; there are more than

10 million admissions to jails across the United

States each year (e.g., Zeng, 2019). Jails house

individuals who are detained, charged but await-

ing sentencing, and those sentenced because

of misdemeanor crimes, whereas prisons house

those convicted of felonies. Because jails dispro-

portionately house poor people, People of Color

(Sawyer & Wagner, 2019), and people with men-

tal illness (Torrey et al., 2010), jail incarceration

has important consequences for inequality (Tur-

ney & Connor, 2019).

In addition, jail incarceration represents a sig-

nicant stressor for individuals and their families

because most incarcerated individuals are par-

ents (Glaze & Marushak, 2008). National esti-

mates indicate that 53% of men and 61% of

women in federal or state prison have minor chil-

dren (Maruschak et al., 2010), with most ini-

tial incarceration occurring before children turn

9 years of age (Murphey & Cooper, 2015). Sev-

eral states have also estimated proportions of

parents in their corrections systems, including

130Family Relations 70 (February 2021): 130–145

DOI:10.1111/fare.12525

Jailed Parents With Young Children131

New York, Ohio, Tennessee, and Minnesota,

with estimates ranging from 54% to 72% of

men and 61% to 85% of women having minor

children (e.g., Shlafer et al., 2019). Comparable

statistics for parents in jail do not exist, although

we know that approximately 5 million children

have experienced the incarceration of a resident

parent in jail or prison by age 14 years (Murphey

& Cooper, 2015).

Previous research has found that separation

from children during incarceration is highly

stressful for incarcerated parents, especially

when their children are young, which may exac-

erbate mental health symptoms in an already

vulnerable population (e.g., Poehlmann, 2005).

The present study examined a broad range

of mental health symptoms in jailed parents

with young children, including examination of

gender, race, trauma, and parenting stress, in

addition to supports and adaptive factors that

might be associated with fewer mental health

problems.

Prisons and jails have become among the

largest mental health providers in the United

States, although they are not equipped to treat

people with mental illness (Torrey et al., 1995).

Using data from a 2004–2005 survey, Torrey

et al. (2010) exposed a dark reality: “In the

United States there are now more than three

times more seriously mentally ill persons in jails

and prisons than in hospitals” (p. 1). Torrey

et al. (2010) indicated that the number of men-

tally ill incarcerated persons continues to rise,

and illness severity is also increasing. Indeed,

James and Glaze (2006) found that more than

half of persons incarcerated in jail reported hav-

ing a diagnosis, treatment, or symptoms of a

mental disorder within the past 12 months, with

people in jail being more affected than people

in prison. For example, 30% of jailed individ-

uals reported symptoms of major depression,

whereas 23% of imprisoned individuals reported

such symptoms (James & Glaze, 2006). Sim-

ilarly, a recent analysis of the Fragile Fami-

lies and Child Well-Being data set found that

jailed fathers had higher odds of experiencing

depression, heavy drinking, and illicit drug use

than imprisoned fathers, although they did not

include mothers or examine a broad range of

mental health symptoms (Yi et al., 2017).

In this article, we examine thought

problems, depression, anxiety, attention-

decit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), aggres-

sion, somatic problems, and substance use.

Although depression, anxiety, aggression, and

substance abuse have been examinedin incarcer-

ated parents previously (e.g., Loper et al., 2009),

the most serious types of mental illness (e.g.,

thought problems) have not. Moreover,although

ADHD is a common neurodevelopmental dis-

order that has been linked to criminal behavior

because of underlying impulsivity (Behnken

et al., 2014), it has not been examined in

incarcerated parents previously. In addition,

previous research suggests that Black adults

may show their depression with more somatic

symptoms compared with White adults (e.g.,

Das et al., 2006), so it is important to include

this aspect of mental health.

E M

The contexts of being in jail, being a parent,

and early traumatic experiences inuence the

development and well-being of incarcerated

individuals (e.g., Poehlmann, 2005). Bron-

fenbrenner’s bioecological systems model

(Bronfenbrenner, 1979; Bronfenbrenner &

Ceci, 1994) has been applied to incarcerated

parents and their children by several scholars

(e.g., Arditti, 2016; Poehlmann et al., 2010).

In this study, the microsystem level is concep-

tualized as family relationships; relationships

involve proximal processes, which are thought

to be the driver of development (Bronfenbren-

ner & Ceci, 1994). At the mesosystem level, a

relevant example is the relationship between

extended family members and the child’s care-

giver, which often inuences how frequently

parent–child contact occurs during incarcera-

tion and support to parents (e.g., Poehlmann

et al., 2010). An example of the exosystem is a

factor that inuences the individual indirectly

by inuencing other individuals in the microsys-

tem. For example, policies and procedures set

by local governments inuence the well-being

of jailed parents by determining the conditions

of their connement. The macrosystem includes

factors of society and the community that inu-

ence the individual, such as stigma associated

with being incarcerated, which can inuence

mental health reentry success. In addition to the

present contexts, early experiences that com-

prised jailed parents’ microsystem in the past

may affect the their development, parenting,

and future behavior and interactions with the

world, including mental health. Parent gender

and race are important considerations regarding