Lecture 6B: Women Offenders Flashcards
What trend have we been seeing with women offenders since 2017-18?
- The numbers are low compared to men, however there is an interesting increase
- Were seeing a trend of more women being incarcerated federally
Why should we focus on women offenders?
-Low prevalence (females account for 2-9% of prison population worldwide), masks any potential uniqueness; eclipsed by the male majority -Increasing numbers within prison system worldwide. Since 2000, 50% increase for women vs. 18% increase for men
What are the two requirements we have to study women offenders?
- Ethical requirement: “Women shall not automatically be excluded from research solely on the basis of sex or reproductive capacity” (Tri-Council Policy Statement: Ethical Conduct for Research Involving Humans)
- Legal Requirement: The Corrections and Conditional Release Act says “The Service shall…provide programs designed particularly to address the needs of female offenders”
What is the Gender similarity hypothesis vs. Gender differences Hypothesis?
- Gender Similarities hypothesis: posits that men and women are similar on most, but not all psychological variables
- Gender Differences Hypothesis: States that men and women are vastly different psychologically speaking
What was the method of Hyde (2005) study on gender differences?
- Reviewed 46 different meta-analyses
-128 individual effect sizes
Domains examined:
-Cognitive abilities
-Social/personality variables
-Psychological well-being
-Motor behaviour
-Other
What did Hyde (2005) find in terms of Where are the gender differences and when do they emerge?
- Personality: Women more agreeable; men more assertive
- Sexuality: Men have more casual attitudes about sex
- Physical aggression: Men are more physically aggressive
What were the main conclusions of Hyde (2005)?
- Gender differences have been vastly over-stated
- The evidence strongly favours the gender similarities hypothesis
- However, gender differences to exist (e.g., aggression, different contexts)
- Results replicated recently (Zell et al., 2015, 386 meta-analyses!)
What is a typical women offender?
- Has committed fraud, theft, common assault, and administration of justice offences
- Violence is usually emotions-driven (anger, jealousy, revenge) occurring in the context of relationships
- Violence is less likely to be instrumentally motivated (e.g. pure greed)
What is the gender gap in crime?
-The gender gap in crime – males account for the vast majority of crime, particular violent crime
-Gender gap is widest for violent crimes: Homicide, robbery, rape, weapons-offences (9/10 are male offenders); 85% of serial killers are male
-Gender gap is most narrow for non-violent crimes:
Shoplifting, writing bad checks (1 in 2 are female); welfare fraud (3 in 4 are female)
What are the Big differences between male and female offenders?
- Lower risk & less serious offences
- More mental health problems
- More extensive histories of childhood abuse
- Relationship and attachment deficits are more prevalent
What was the only domain that men scored higher than women on in the dynamic factors identification and analysis revised (DFIA-R)?
- attitude is the only domain where men are higher than women
- look to see which offenders have elevated needs which will then inform correctional programming
What is the comparison between men and women mental health disorders?
Men ~ 70% met criteria for at least one mental disorder 17% mood disorder 3.3% psychotic 50% substance use 30% anxiety 16% borderline personality 44% antisocial personality
Women ~ 80% met criteria for at least one mental disorder 22% mood disorder 5% psychotic 76% substance use 54% anxiety 33% borderline personality 49% antisocial personality
What does the report on self harm in women’s prisons illustrate?
- Self harm is poorly understood (don’t know how to treat this problem)
- Incidents of self harm has tripled
- There have been improvements in how CSC manages offenders with mental health concerns
- Upon admission to custody, offenders are screened by CSC’s computerized mental health screening system
- In FY16/17, CSC invested $80 million to support the treatment and management of federal offenders with mental health needs
- As of August 1, 2017, offenders with a serious mental illness with significant impairment cannot be admitted to administrative segregation.
- Continued efforts are necessary!
What is the one universal truth or fact about crime?
There is one universal truth about crime – boys/men commit more crime, particularly more violent and serious crime than girls/women regardless of the research methodology or disciplinary orientation of the researcher
What are the theories of female offending? why do they commit crime?
- Gender neutral: general criminological theories that explicitly or implicitly assume that what works for men works equally well for women.
- Female centered: posit that we need entirely different explanations of female offending.
Gender neutral theories: the PIC-R
- PIC-R = Personal, Interpersonal, Community Reinforcement (Andrews & Bonta, 2003)
1. crime is learned
2. rewards > costs = crime
3. strongest risk factors: attitudes, associates, criminal history, antisocial orientation
4. weak risk factors: self-esteem, SES - Applies to all individuals regardless of gender or ethnic origin
- Risk, Need, and Responsivity (RNR) principles
Is the RNR perspective applicable to women?
-In general, evidence to date supports the application of the theory to women.
Dowden and Andrews (1999) found that treatment interventions following the
-RNR perspective were associated with enhanced reductions in reoffending.
How did feminist centered theories arise?
Arose from feminist critiques of the criminological literature
- Sexist (biological explanations more important for women; environment more important for men)
- Do not adequately explain the gender gap in offending patterns
- Women are invisible
-Female-centered holistic theories (grounded in ideology/feminist thought, qualitative and descriptive research and the ‘gender difference hypothesis’)
What do female centered theories posit?
- Gender is afforded central causal significance
- All female-centered theories posit that the onset, maintenance and eventual desistance of female criminal conduct is different from that of male criminal conduct
What is the feminist pathways theory?
Developed a conceptional framework of the five pathways women often take into crime:
- Street women
- Battered women
- Harmed and harming women
- Drug-connected women
- Economically motivated women
What are the criticisms of the feminist pathways theory?
- Small sample sizes and the reliance on qualitative research methods
- Do not disaggregate data by age (girls vs women)
- Do not compare with men
- More research is needed!
Prevalence vs. relevance of elevated need
- We’ve seen that women have very elevated needs
- But does that mean that a highly prevalent need should be addressed through intervention? Is it related to offending patterns?
- We need to confirm that these needs are relevant to criminal behaviour
Do gender neutral assessment tools work well with women offenders?
- Research on the DFIA-R (Stewart et al. 2017) has found that ratings are associated with returns to custody – being rated as higher need is associated with greater rates of return.
- BUT, this research also found that certain items seem to be more important for women compared to men: Financial instability, Education concerns, Problematic intimate relationships
Why are gender neutral tolls criticized even though they do seem to work
- They do not recognize unique female pathways to crime
- They may over-estimate risk – a high risk woman is not the same as a high risk man
- Very few tools are built from the ground up for women and girls
- Service Planning Inventory for Women (SPIN-W; Orbis Partners, 2007)
- Women’s Risk/Need Assessment (WRNA; VanVoorhis, 2013)
What is a Gender neutral risk factor vs. Gender salient vs. Gender specific?
Gender-neutral risk factor: A risk factor that predicts criminal behaviour equally well for men and women.
Gender-salient risk factor: A risk factor that predicts criminal behaviour for both men and women, however, the prediction is stronger for one gender.
Gender-specific: A risk factor that predicts only for one gender and not the other.
Utility of the WRNA in pretrial defendants: what does the study mean?
- Many risk/need factors included in the WRNA, such as mental health, homelessness, and family support appear to be associated with unsatisfactory outcomes for both men AND women – suggesting these may not be unique to women offenders.
- Associations with community outcomes appear to be stronger for women as compared to men – suggesting gender-saliency over gender-specificity.
Gender-neutral assessment tools appear to work relatively well with women. But still…
There are nuanced differences that male tools inherently don’t capture as well
- the context – why is she high risk? The trauma-induced pathway to the criminal justice system
- Importance of family dynamics
- Impact of transient living – group homes, streets
Importance of older, male peers/romantic partners
- Not enough emphasis placed of mental health factors
How does security classification within the CSC work for women offenders?
- When offenders are admitted to CSC custody, both men and women are assessed using the Custody Rating Scale (CRS) to determine security placement: minimum, medium, maximum
- HOWEVER, reclassification of security levels is determined with the use of a gender-informed assessment tool: the Security Reclassification Scale for Women (SRSW)
- the items on the SRSW don’t look like they are unique to women but they were built from a sample of women (ie., gender informed)
What is the history of women’s federal incarceration?
- Prison for Women, Kingston ON: 1934-2000
- Creating Choices, 1990 (is the go to referral for any womens corrections: creating choices, has recommendations and guidelines to treat women federal offenders in a more humane environment)
- Commission of Inquiry into Certain Events at the Prison for Women in Kingston, 1996
What is the situation today for women incarceration?
Situation today
5 regional facilities: Nova Scotia, Quebec, Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia
1 Indigenous Healing Lodge: Saskatchewan
What are the five guiding principles of creating choices (gender specific offender management model)
Empowerment Meaningful and Responsible Choices Respect and Dignity Supportive Environment Shared Responsibility
What did recent meta analytic work find about correctional programming for women?
- More recent meta-analytic research examining interventions found positive outcomes for women participating in correctional programs
- What was particularly interesting was among higher quality studies, gender-informed or gender-responsive treatment approaches were more effective than gender-neutral programs.
What is women offender correctional programming?
- Adheres to the principles of RNR, BUT driven by the five core principles identified by the Creating Choices report (1990): Empowerment
Meaningful and responsible, choices, Respect and dignity
Supportive environment,
Shared responsibility
-The focus is a holistic, women-centered model of programming
Depending on a womans level of static risk/dynamic need, what are the different programming paths?
- Women’s Engagement Program
- Women’s Moderate Intensity Program
- Women’s High Intensity Program
- Women’s Self Management Program (available both in the institution and the community)
- There are also Indigenous-specific versions of these programs (AWOCP)
What are the key elements of the gender responsive models?
-Holistic approach (criminogenic and non-criminogenic factors addressed simultaneously):
Target addictions, be skills-based, enhance self-efficacy whilst dealing with internalizing mental health issues
- Greater emphasis placed on ‘responsivity’ issues: Trauma-informed, relational, female-only, strengths
parental stress, empowerment focus, safety issues
-Multiple Outcomes: recidivism reduction, healthy relationships restored
Has research found support for the WOCP/AWOCP?
- Recent research has found support for this program portfolio (Derkzen, Harris, Wardrop, & Thompson, 2017)
- Post-program measurement found improvements in motivation for change, social problem-solving, self-efficacy, and other correctional objectives.
- Women who completed all the programs they were enrolled in were less likely to return custody when released compared to those who did not.
What works (in terms of correctional treatment programs)?
Recent meta-analysis (Gobeil, Blanchette & Stewart, 2016): 37 treatment outcome studies, 22,000 women offenders
- Results: Odds of recidivating were 22 to 35% less likely for women who participated in correctional treatment vs. those who did not
- Findings were the same for programs classified as GR or gender neutral (i.e., cognitive behavioral), BUT there was a moderator
- the moderator was methodological rigour
- Analysis of methodologically rigourous studies only illustrated that GR programs outperformed GN programs
What is the take home message?
The evidence supports an integrated approach rather than an ‘either’, ‘or’ strategy
What is the remaining debate?
-Most gender responsive scholars support the risk and specific responsivity principles (mixed support for cognitive behaviourism)
-The big debate: what need factors should be targeted?
Gender responsive scholars-relational dysfunction, addictions, abuse/trauma, mental health, empowerment
Gender neutral scholars—criminal attitudes and criminal associates
