Objectives:

Drawing on the life course and social stress perspectives, this paper examines age variation in the mental health consequences of justice system involvement by assessing arrest, conviction, or incarceration as possible age-graded stressors that amplify harm at younger ages of involvement.

Methods:

Individual fixed effect regression models utilizing National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (1997) data test whether age moderates the mental health impact of arrest, conviction, or incarceration. Follow-up analyses for moderated associations compute and compare age-specific relationships to identify differences in the significance and magnitude of mental health consequences for contacts spanning late adolescence, emerging adulthood, and adulthood.

Results:

The incarceration-mental health relationship is moderated by age, as significant harms to mental health are exclusively observed following secure confinement in late adolescence (ages 16–17) and emerging adulthood (18–24), but not in adulthood (25–33). The lack of moderation between arrest and mental health indicates a universally harmful experience at all ages.

Conclusions:

Evidence supports conceptualizing incarceration as an age-graded social stressor that is correlated with pronounced harm to mental health during late adolescence and emerging adulthood. Future research should identify the mechanisms of this unique stress response following earlier incarcerations and its long-term salience for processes of cumulative disadvantage.

中文翻译：

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司法系统参与心理健康的年龄分级后果

目标：

本文从生命历程和社会压力的角度出发，通过评估逮捕、定罪或监禁作为可能的年龄分级压力源，在较年轻的参与年龄时放大伤害，从而研究了司法系统参与所造成的心理健康后果的年龄变化。

方法：

利用全国青年纵向调查 (1997) 数据的个体固定效应回归模型测试年龄是否会减轻逮捕、定罪或监禁对心理健康的影响。调节关联的后续分析计算和比较特定年龄的关系，以确定跨越青春期晚期、成年初期和成年期的接触者心理健康后果的重要性和程度的差异。

结果：

监禁与心理健康的关系受年龄影响，因为在青春期后期（16-17 岁）和成年期（18-24 岁）安全监禁后才观察到对心理健康的重大危害，但在成年期（25-33 岁）则不然. 逮捕和心理健康之间缺乏节制表明所有年龄段的人都有普遍有害的经历。

结论：

证据支持将监禁概念化为一种按年龄分级的社会压力源，与青春期后期和成年初期对心理健康的明显伤害相关。未来的研究应该确定早期监禁后这种独特的压力反应的机制及其对累积劣势过程的长期显着性。