Psychology
Introduction
Historically, putting a person into prison means that he or she committed an act in which the law prohibits. Ideally, imprisonment against a law offender is the way to give justice for those who were victimized or just a mere sanction because of their actions. Long ago, imprisonment was a form of punishment for those who did wrong against the society. Prisons were locked up inside the jail and being inflicted with sufferings on their bodies and in some cases, prisoners were tortured to death. However, the imprisonment concepts in our time are in contrast of what the old imprisonment concepts were. Our current model of imprisonment is not just a mere intention of corporal punishments, but a concept that works on the prisoner’s mind as well as his body. Part of today’s imprisonment concept is to rehabilitate the offender’s attitude, mold him to be a good person, and in make him ready to face the community as a better individual. Within the process of rehabilitation, many factors are affecting the individual’s well-being, including psychological effects. This specific factor is evident among prisoners who have mental health needs. Numerous evidence was written to show that imprisonment has both positive and negative effects to a prisoner that has a mental health illness.
Psychological Effects of Imprisonment
There are cases of imprisonment that could produce psychological trauma in which many symptoms that manifest psychopathology. Thus, the implications of mental health are potentially very important. At the most secure level of the prison, which is the Supermax or the maximum security unit, many psychological effects come out of the prisoners who are detained in such control unit. There are many mental health issues in this condition as well as the policies by which offenders are placed in them. Craig Haney (2003) asserts that one of the issues that include in this level of the control unit is the number of prisoners suffering from mental health issues. Since these prisoners are more challenged when it comes to their mental health, they are more likely to experience trauma compare to other prisoners who do not have a mental health issue.
A normal prisoner would describe his confinement in a maximum-security as a form of psychological torture. Thus, most of them are in different degrees of psychic pain, which most of them are struggling to cope with everyday stress. However, given that almost everyone suffers from their confinement, there is a bigger chance that those prisoners with pre-existing mental health issues are the ones who have a greater risk of having these sufferings deepen into becoming more disabling and permanent (Haney, 2003). This is because a normal prisoner would be able to cope with his traumatic experiences faster than those who are already suffering from mental illness even before they got into strict confinement. This prisoner could have his mental illness into a worse as what they need is a different way to address their psychological needs than those who do not have a pre-existing mental illness.
Haney (2003) added that prisoners who are more likely to have a risk are those who suffer from emotional instability, prisoners who have a depression or similar mood disorders, prisoners with a developmental disability, and prisoners whose reality contact is already weak.
Upon evaluating Craig Haney’s claims, there is a good rationale to believe that many of these mentally challenged prisoners will be unable to endure the psychological assault of isolation, the lack human care contact, the profound inactivity and idleness. In addition, the otherwise extraordinary stressful nature of maximum confinement without the presence of significant decompensation and deterioration also affect prisoners.
It is not only that prisoners with mental illness are vulnerable to having their mental issues worsen when they are imprisoned. These prisoners are also at risk of self-harm and suicide. Mentally ill prisoners are one of the contributors of numbers of suicide cases in prisons. Since they have less capability than normal prisoners when it comes to a broader way of thinking, mentally challenged prisoners may likely unable to cope with the prison environment that leads them to commit suicidal acts. Luke Birmingham (2003) claims that prison environments make them acutely distressed in which the feeling of helplessness, fear, and isolation may lead to harm or fatal act (Birmingham, 2003). Therefore, developing an approach on how to handle such cases involving prisoners with mental health needs is a must so as to protect them from self-inflicting actions. These people are somehow different in terms of how they think about something. They may experience an event that could be very stressful on their part in which some normal prisoners feel otherwise.
That is why Birmingham (2003) concluded that a prison is an unremitting place, which gives conditions that are unsuitable for those who suffer from severe mental issues. Thus, it may be safe to say that a prisoner is a vulnerable place to develop a mental health problem and that people who have pre-existing mental health issues are susceptible to imprisonment.
Moreover, imprisonment has no benefit to a person’s mental health because not all prisoners with mental health problems are being transferred to a mental health institution for proper treatment. Birmingham (2003) also added that some prisoners who have mental health needs are not being detected by prison staff that makes the former’s condition become worse.
The purpose of imprisonment is to allow the prisoners to reflect and rediscover their conscience through spiritual conversion. Imprisonment is designed to let the prisoners go back to what they have done wrong and start their new life that begins in the prison. However, it was later discovered that being inside the prison is a form of torture (Tomar, 2013).
The torture that was written in the article states that the imprisonment tortures the prisoners psychologically. It is relatively applicable especially to prisoners suffering from mental health illness. In fact, there are adverse psychological effects that imprisonment brings, which would worsen the mental health issues. Tomar (2013) added that these undesirable effects are dissatisfactions with life, delusions, excessive depression, and even claustrophobia in which the latter is also known to be bad for people who have mental health needs. Along with these effects are feeling of panic, madness on many instances, which may all boils down to one common effect and that are the psychological stress. Once a prisoner with mental health needs experiences a lot of stress in the prison, and the outcome of hurting themselves physically may occur.
On the other hand, there is a running program that may help provide positive results for prisoners with mental health needs (Tomar, 2013). A new field in psychology, which is called positive psychology, studies factors that nurture and produce positive emotions. Its aim is to break the abundance of negative feeling inside the prison that can worsen the psychological status of prisoners with mental health needs. Therefore, negative effects of imprisonment could turn into positive ones by applying positive thoughts to prisoners with mental health needs.
What Shivani Tomar wrote is an example that, in a positive way, a prisoner suffering from mental health issues may adapt this program’s goal after the required mental health treatment. However, it could be better if this program will be applied throughout the prisons. It also shows that there could be a way to treat, rehabilitate, and make the prisoners with mental health needs to be ready to go back and be with the normal community.
This program could be a great help for prisoners especially those who have mental health needs. However, it is still evident that the imprisonment has its natural atmosphere that directly affects mentally sick prisoners. Thus, it was also concluded that imprisonment could have a previous well person to weaken his mental health, which could eventually lead his mental health to worse (ohrn.nhs.uk). In addition, prisoners’ mental illness symptoms deteriorate while inside the prison. There are a number of factors that cause this mental deterioration, which may include non-adherence to medication, inadequate treatment, and even stressful events in life to which being imprisoned serves as an example.
Conclusion
Suffering from mental illness is difficult, but what makes it worse is when the patient is inside the prison. Being inside the atmosphere of the prison could affect a person psychologically and could worsen the mental health needs of those who have pre-existing mental health problems. There are numerous factors that could deteriorate these pre-existing mental issues. Thus, these factors perhaps are hard to get rid of especially in the prison’s atmosphere. Therefore, it is safe to say that prison has negative psychological effects more than a positive on prisoners who have mental health needs, and these types of prisoners must primarily be treated to avoid worse mental health possibilities.
References
Burmingham, L. (2003). The Mental Health of Prisoners. Advances in Psychiatric Treatment, 9, 191-201. doi:10.1192/apt.9.3.191
Haney, C. (2003). Mental Health Issues In Long-Term Solitary and "Supermax" Confinement. Crime and Delinquency, 49(1), 124-156. doi:10.1177/0011128702239239
The Offender Health Research Network (2010, April). The Pathway of Prisoners with Mental Health Problems through Prison Health Services and the Effect of the Prison Environment on the Mental Health of Prisoners. Retrieved from http://www.ohrn.nhs.uk/OHRNResearch/EnvPath.pdf
Tomar, S. (2013). The Psychological Effects of Incarceration on Inmates: Can we Promote Positive Emotion on Inmates. Delphi Psychiatry Journal, 16(1), 66-72. Retrieved from http://medind.nic.in/daa/t13/i1/daat13i1p66.pdf
