Abstract
Approximately 11.7 million individuals were admitted to jails in the US in 2013, similar to the previous year, and national estimates indicate that 36 % of these individuals are parents of children under 15 years of age. Many children with parents who are incarcerated in jail or prison experience multiple risk factors and they are more likely to develop a host of health and behavioral health difficulties in childhood and adulthood compared to their peers. Maintenance of relationships with incarcerated parents is often seen as important for children’s well-being during the parental incarceration period, yet concerns have been raised about visitation in corrections facilities, especially visits involving security procedures or non-contact visits. The present study is the first to report observational data about young children’s visits to jails that used Plexiglas barriers or video monitors for visitation. Results of observations of 20 children indicated that children engaged verbally and visually with their incarcerated parents. They stayed in close proximity to the caregivers who brought them and engaged in an increasing amount of contact maintenance as the visit progressed. Children spent a surprising amount of time watching the visits occurring adjacent to them because of the lack of privacy during visits.
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Acknowledgements
This research was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health (R21HD068581, PI: Poehlmann and P30HD03352, PI: Mailick) and the University of Wisconsin. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH. Special thanks to Racine, Dane, and Sauk County Sheriff’s offices and jail staff for their support of the project; to Beverlee Baker, Susan Bulla, and Sue Nagelkerk from University of Wisconsin-Extension for their work on the project; to numerous undergraduate students for assistance with data collection and coding; and to the families who participated in this research.
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Poehlmann-Tynan, J. et al. (2015). Young Children’s Behavioral and Emotional Reactions to Plexiglas and Video Visits with Jailed Parents. In: Poehlmann-Tynan, J. (eds) Children’s Contact with Incarcerated Parents. SpringerBriefs in Psychology(). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16625-4_3
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