Abstract

Literature holds that religious engagement can help prisoners cope with prison life and suggests it may affect the likelihood of recidivism. But despite agreement that religion supports identity transformation and generates social control, few studies have examined the utility of these mechanisms during both prison and reentry. The relationship between religion and desistance may be complicated by structural barriers to reentry and high rates of substance use among incarcerated populations. We address this gap using a longitudinal mixed methods design based on data collected from men in a Therapeutic Community in a Pennsylvania prison (N = 174 for quantitative analyses, N = 51 for qualitative). We use several methods to (1) compare the prevalence of psychological versus sociological mechanisms of religion in prison, (2) assess variation in recidivism outcomes by trajectory of religious engagement, and (3) explore the utility of religion in overcoming structural barriers to successful reentry.

摘要

文献认为，宗教参与可以帮助囚犯应对监狱生活，并表明它可能会影响再犯的可能性。但是，尽管一致认为宗教支持身份转变并产生社会控制，但很少有研究检验这些机制在入狱和重返社会期间的效用。宗教与反抗之间的关系可能因重返社会的结构性障碍和被监禁人群的高药物使用率而变得复杂。我们使用基于从宾夕法尼亚州监狱治疗社区中的男性收集的数据的纵向混合方法设计来解决这一差距（定量分析 N = 174，定性分析 N = 51）。我们使用几种方法来 (1) 比较监狱中宗教的心理机制与社会学机制的普遍性，