Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-13T05:14:00.416Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Older prisoners: psychological distress and associations with mental health history, cognitive functioning, socio-demographic, and criminal justice factors

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 November 2015

Susan Baidawi
Susan Baidawi*
Affiliation:
Department of Social Work, Monash University, Victoria, Australia
*
Correspondence should be addressed to: Susan Baidawi, Department of Social Work, Monash University, PO Box 197, Caulfield East 3145, Australia. Phone: +61(3) 9903 1064; Fax: +61(3) 9905 4302. Email: susan.baidawi@monash.edu.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Background:

The growth among older prisoner populations, including in Australia, necessitates an understanding of this group in order to generate effective management strategies. One particular concern is the mental well-being of older prisoners. This study aimed to determine the level of psychological distress among sentenced prisoners aged 50 years and older, to compare this level to that seen among younger prisoners and older people in the community, and to investigate which mental health history, cognitive functioning, socio-demographic, and criminal justice characteristics were associated with psychological distress.

Methods:

A cross-sectional survey of 173 older (M = 63 years) and 60 younger prisoners (M = 34 years) in two Australian jurisdictions was conducted. The Kessler Psychological Distress (K10) scale was administered with prisoners and additional data were collected from interviews and participant health and corrections files. K10 scores were compared to community norms using data from the Australian Health Survey.

Results:

Average K10 scores of the older prisoners were significantly lower than the younger prisoners’ (p = 0.04), though the effect size was small (r = 0.1). Significantly, higher distress levels were observed in comparison to the general population (p < 0.001), with older prisoners being three times more likely to display very high levels of distress (12.3% vs. 3.7%). Higher psychological distress scores among older prisoners were significantly associated with female gender (p = 0.002) and a history of mental health issues (p = 0.002).

Conclusions:

While the levels of distress seen among older prisoners were significantly lower than that of younger prisoners, their higher levels of distress in comparison to community norms demonstrate a need for correctional services to be attuned to the mental health of the expanding older prisoner population.

Keywords

older prisonersaging prisonerselderly prisonerspsychological distressmental healthgender differences
Type
Research Article
Information
International Psychogeriatrics , Volume 28 , Issue 3 , March 2016 , pp. 385 - 395
Copyright
Copyright © International Psychogeriatric Association 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aday, R. H. and Krabill, J. J. (2012). Older and geriatric offenders: critical issues for the 21st century. In Gideon, L. (ed.), Special Needs Offenders in Correctional Institutions (pp. 203–232). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
Atkins, J., Naismith, S. L., Luscombe, G. M. and Hickie, I. B. (2013). Psychological distress and quality of life in older persons: relative contributions of fixed and modifiable risk factors. Biomed Central Psychiatry, 13, 249–259.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). (2011a). Deaths, Australia 2011 (cat no. 3302.0). Canberra: ABS.Google Scholar
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). (2011b). Prisoners in Australia (cat no. 4517.0). Canberra: ABS.Google Scholar
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). (2012). Prisoners in Australia (cat no. 4517.0). Canberra: ABS.Google Scholar
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). (2013). Australian Health Survey: updated results, 2011–2012. (cat. no. 4364.0.55.0003), CURF, Expanded CURF, Remote Access Data Laboratory [RADL]. Canberra: ABS.Google Scholar
Baidawi, S. and Trotter, C. (in press). Psychological distress among older prisoners: a literature review. Journal of Forensic Social Work, doi: 10.1080/1936928X.2015.1075166.Google Scholar
Baidawi, S. et al. (2011). Older prisoners - A challenge for Australian corrections. Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice, 426, 1–8.Google Scholar
Burling, K. L. (1999). A correlational investigation of the relationship between psychological distress, life satisfaction, and health care utilization among elderly male inmates. PhD Thesis, University of Iowa.Google Scholar
Butler, T., Andrews, G., Allnutt, S., Sakashita, C., Smith, N. E. and Basson, J. (2006). Mental disorders in Australian prisoners: a comparison with a community sample. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 40, 272–276.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Byles, J., Gallienne, L., Blyth, F. M. and Banks, E. (2012). Relationship of age and gender to the prevalence and correlates of psychological distress in later life. International Psychogeriatrics, 24, 1009–1018.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crawley, E. (2005). Institutional thoughtlessness in prisons and its impacts on the day-to-day prison lives of elderly men. Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 21, 350–363.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davoren, M. et al. (2015). Older men and older women remand prisoners: mental illness, physical illness, offending patterns and needs. International Psychogeriatrics, 27, 747–755.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fazel, S., Hope, T., O’Donnell, I. and Jacoby, R. (2001). Hidden psychiatric morbidity in elderly prisoners. British Journal of Psychiatry, 179, 535–539.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fazel, S., Hope, T., O’Donnell, I. and Jacoby, R. (2004). Unmet treatment needs of older prisoners: a primary care survey. Age and Ageing, 33, 396–398.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Folstein, M., Folstein, S. and McHugh, P. (1975). “Mini-mental state”: a practical method for grading the cognitive state of patients for the clinician. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 12, 189–198.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gallagher, E. (1988). Older men in prison: Emotional, social, and physical health characteristics. PhD Thesis, Simon Fraser University.Google Scholar
Grant, A. (1999). Elderly inmates: issues for Australia. Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice, 115, 1–6.Google Scholar
Hayes, A. J., Burns, A., Turnbull, P. and Shaw, J. J. (2012). The health and social needs of older male prisoners. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 27, 1155–1162.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kakoullis, A., LeMesurier, N. and Kingston, P. (2010). The mental health of older prisoners. International Psychogeriatrics, 22, 693–701.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kessler, R. C. et al. (2002). Short screening scales to monitor population prevalences and trends in non-specific psychological distress. Psychological Medicine, 32, 959–976.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kingston, P., Le Mesurier, N., Yorston, G., Wardle, S. and Heath, L. (2011). Psychiatric morbidity in older prisoners: unrecognized and undertreated. International Psychogeriatrics, 23, 1354–1360.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Koenig, H. G., Johnson, S., Bellard, J., Denker, M. and Fenlon, R. (1995). Depression and anxiety disorder among older male inmates at a federal correctional facility. Psychiatric Services, 46, 399–401.Google Scholar
Leach, J. and Neto, A. (2011). Offender Population Trends: Aged Offenders in NSW, Research Bulletin. Sydney: Corrective Services New South Wales.Google Scholar
Mirowsky, J. and Ross, C. E. (1992). Age and depression. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 33, 187–205.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Murdoch, N., Morris, P. and Holmes, C. (2008). Depression in elderly life sentence prisoners. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 23, 957–962.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
O’Connor, D. and Parslow, R. (2010). Mental health scales and psychiatric diagnoses: responses to GHQ-12, K-10 and CIDI across the lifespan. Journal of Affective Disorders, 121, 263–267.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Paul, C., Ayis, S. and Ebrahim, S. (2006). Psychological distress, loneliness and disability in old age. Psychology, Health and Medicine, 11, 221–232.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Schofield, P., Butler, T., Hollis, S. and D’este, C. (2011). Are prisoners reliable survey respondents? A validation of self-reported traumatic brain injury (TBI) against hospital medical records. Brain Injury, 25, 74–82.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Slade, T., Grove, R. and Burgess, P. (2011). Kessler psychological distress scale: normative data from the 2007 Australian national survey of mental health and wellbeing. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 45, 308–316.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Teller, F. E. and Howell, R. J. (1981). The older prisoner: criminal and psychological characteristics. Criminology, 18, 549–555.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trotter, C. and Baidawi, S. (2015). Older prisoners: challenges for inmates and prison management. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 48, 200–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vega, M. and Silverman, M. (1988). Stress and the elderly convict. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 32, 153–162.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wahidin, A. (2004). Older Women in the Criminal Justice System: Running Out of Time. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.Google Scholar
Williams, B. A., Lindquist, K. L., Sudore, R. L., Strupp, H. M., Willmott, D. J. and Walter, L. C. (2006). Being old and doing time: functional impairment and adverse experiences of geriatric female prisoners. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 54, 702–707.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed