Women’s Pathways: Replication and Generalizability Across State Prison Systems

• Author: Tim Brennan,Eugenie Jackson
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00938548221096667
• Published date: 01 September 2022
• Date: 01 September 2022
• Subject Matter: Articles

CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND BEHAVIOR, 2022, Vol. 49, No. 9, September 2022, 1323 –1341.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/00938548221096667

Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions

© 2022 International Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology

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WOMEN’S PATHWAYS

Replication and Generalizability Across State Prison

Systems

TIM BRENNAN

EUGENIE JACKSON

Northpointe, Inc.

This study demonstrates the replication and validation of a prior model of women’s pathways to prison that was initially

developed in California Women’s prisons and subsequently implemented in the Massachusetts Department of Correction

(MADOC) women’s prison in 2013. The following four main pathways were identified: (1) Quasi-normal, least dis-

turbed, drug and situational offending; (2) lifelong abused and depressed drug abusing women; (3) socialized subcultural

women, with chronic crimes and drug abuse; and (4) abused and aggressive, early onset and multi-need women with

severe drugs, crime, and mental health issues. Since 2013, this model has routinely functioned in MADOC women’s

prison as an internal classification (IC) for women detainees. Using a newly extracted sample of approximately 1,800

cases from MADOC, several forms of replication and validation were conducted; these demonstrated cross-sample

stability, cros s-method st ability, and stability across time and region. Implications for theory, treatment planning, and

implementation are discussed.

Keywords: incarcerated women; responsivity; typology; validity; gender

Over the last three decades, a substantial body of qualitative and quantitative research

on justice-involved women has progressed over several overlapping phases and

across several disciplinary boundaries. During the 1990s, there was an increasing concern

among both researchers and criminal justice officials that, although the number of incar-

cerated of women was rising rapidly, the classification and assessment systems used for

them were largely designed, validated, and calibrated for men (Blanchette & Brown,

2006; Brennan & Austin, 1997; Hardyman & Van Voorhis, 2004). These concerns included

an effort to identify factors of high importance for women. These factors, often referred

AUTHORS’ NOTE: We wish to thank Claire Kilawee-Corsini, Director of Reentry Services, and the staff

at MADOC for supporting this research and for providing useful feedback during the course of this project.

We also acknowledge the indispensable contributions of Christina Mendoza of Northpointe, Inc. for both

data analysis and document editing. This work is based on a project to develop an internal classification

for the Massachusetts Department of Correction Women’s Prison. Correspondence concerning this article

should be addressed to Tim Brennan, 211 Old Town Way, Simpsonville, SC 29681; e-mail: tim38brennan@

gmail.com.

1096667CJBXXX10.1177/00938548221096667Criminal Justice and BehaviorBrennan, Jackson / Women’s Pathways: Replication and Generalizability

research-article2022

1324 CRIMINAL JUSTICE AND BEHAVIOR

to as gender-responsive (GR), were largely missing from the prevailing assessment and

classification procedures used in criminal justice agencies. Aside from rich biographical

narratives, these efforts began to clarify major GR factors including physical and sexual

abuse, parenting stresses, low self-efficacy, extreme drug dependency, and others (e.g.,

Belknap & Holsinger, 2006; Chesney-Lind, 1997; Daly & Chesney-Lind, 1988; Daly,

1992; Owen, 1998; Richie, 1996). We note that this research on GR factors did not exclude

the importance of the gender-neutral (GN) factors that have perennially been included in

standard assessment systems (e.g., extreme poverty, social marginalization, and socio-

cultural factors).

A landmark event of this phase was the development and validation of the Women’s Risk

Needs Assessment (WRNA), a psychometric instrument that enabled large N studies to sup-

port assessment, classification, and treatment services for women (Van Voorhis et al., 2008).

In 2012, Brennan et al. developed a four-path women’s typology to integrate both GR and

GN factors. This model of women’s pathways to prison is the main topic of the present

project, referred to herein as the 2012 Four-Path Women’s Typology.

THE SEARCH FOR WOMEN’S PATHWAYS TO CRIME—BASIC PATTERNS

While the search for key GR factors was of critical importance, it was naturally paral-

leled by a concern to identify noticeable patterns or conjunctions of factors that may begin

to explain women’s law-breaking behavior. This often intuitive synthesizing process has led

to several configural patterns being identified in the feminist pathways literature. These

included the following: (1) A victimization pattern among women linking serious child

abuse, adult abuse, mental illness, depression, and drug abuse; (2) a marginalization pattern

consisting of poverty, homelessness, and other social disadvantages at the intersection of

gender, race, and class (Bloom et al., 2003; Richie, 1996; Salisbury & Van Voorhis, 2009);

(3) a relational pattern where women are embedded in dysfunctional networks of family,

social, and/or intimate relationships often linked to substance abuse, low self-efficacy, and

depression (Chesney-Lind, 1997; Daly, 1992).

Two important early pathway taxonomies from Daly (1992) and Moffitt (1993) have had

a substantial impact on the explanatory profiles of differential pathways to crime. These have

been widely cited and have motivated multiple replications. Both are important for the pres-

ent project as core elements of these two taxonomies are partially blended into the four basic

pathways of the 2012 Four-Path Women’s Typology. Separate descriptions of the pathways

posited by Daly and Moffitt are provided in this section. Daly formulated the following five

pathways: (1) Street women who have escaped from abusive home lives and entered life on

the streets, with its possible survival regime of drugs, prostitution, or theft; (2) battered

women who have experienced extreme childhood victimization and later abuse from violent,

manipulative adult partners; (3) drug-connected women reflecting a pattern of using and

perhaps trafficking drugs, often with intimate partners or family members; (4) harmed and

harming women who have experienced extreme child and adult abuse, and reflect a com-

plex spectrum of school/vocational failure, drugs, mental health, and chronic crimi nalit y;

and (5) other women who reflect a mix of economic pathways, ranging from basic

survival to greed, and often linked to fraud, theft, embezzlement, precipitated by difficult

emotional situations.