The findings from a growing body of research reveal that incarceration is detrimental for both physical and mental health. Incarceration, however, is typically conceptualized and operationalized as a dichotomy; individuals either have, or have not, been incarcerated. Considering that incarceration can range from one day to several years, a dichotomous measure may be overlooking important variations across lengths of exposure. In addition, most inmates are incarcerated more than once. In this study, we help to fill this gap by examining the relationship between incarceration dosage, measured as time served and number of spells, and mental health among a sample of young adults from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1997. By using fixed‐effects modeling, we find that the number of spells and the months incarcerated are positively related to mental health symptoms and the likelihood of depression. The association, however, is contingent on whether a respondent is currently or formerly incarcerated. Among current inmates, more time served is expected to improve mental health and the number of spells is unrelated to either outcome.

中文翻译：

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二分法之外：监禁的剂量和心理健康*

越来越多的研究结果表明，监禁对身心健康均有害。然而，监禁通常被概念化和实施为二分法。个人已经或没有被监禁。考虑到监禁的时间可能从一天到几年不等，因此，二分法可能会忽略整个暴露时间的重要变化。此外，大多数囚犯被囚禁超过一次。在这项研究中，我们通过检查1997年国家青年纵向研究中的年轻人样本中的监禁剂量，服刑时间和咒语数量与心理健康之间的关系，来帮助填补这一空白。通过使用固定效应造型，我们发现，咒语的数量和被监禁的月份与心理健康症状和抑郁的可能性呈正相关。但是，该关联取决于响应者是当前还是以前被监禁。在目前的囚犯中，预计将有更多的时间来改善心理健康，并且咒语的数量与任何一种结局都无关。