Objectives

To examine the effect of prison visits on prisoners’ levels of anger, hostility, and positive feelings and examine which prisoner and visit characteristics moderate visits’ emotional impact.

Method

A pretest-posttest study involving 110 male inmates from two maximum security prisons in Israel was conducted. Prisoners were surveyed about their emotions a day before and day following a visit using validated scales to measure state-anger, trait-anger, hostility, and positive feelings. The survey also included questions about characteristics of the prisoner and the visit. Significant change in emotions before and after the visit is assessed with a t-test, and stepwise linear regression is used to examine the association between prisoner and visit characteristics and changes in emotions.

Results

State-anger, trait-anger, and hostility all declined following the visit, but the average level of positive feelings did not change. Regression results indicate an association between these changes and prisoner education, crime type, prisoners’ marital status, time in prison, and whether the prisoners’ children were present at the visit.

Conclusions

A significant decline in negative emotions following visits points to visits as a beneficial activity for prison inmates; theoretical and practical conclusions are discussed.

中文翻译：

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监狱探访和囚犯的情绪：一项前测-后测研究

目标

考察监狱探视对囚犯的愤怒、敌意和积极情绪水平的影响，并检查哪些囚犯和探视特征能缓和探视对情绪的影响。

方法

对来自以色列两座戒备森严的监狱的 110 名男性囚犯进行了一项前测后测研究。囚犯在访问前一天和访问后第二天接受了他们的情绪调查，使用经过验证的量表来衡量状态愤怒、特质愤怒、敌意和积极情绪。调查还包括有关囚犯特征和访问的问题。使用t检验评估访问前后情绪的显着变化，并使用逐步线性回归检查囚犯和访问特征与情绪变化之间的关联。

结果

访问后，状态愤怒、特质愤怒和敌意都下降了，但积极情绪的平均水平没有变化。回归结果表明这些变化与囚犯教育、犯罪类型、囚犯的婚姻状况、入狱时间以及囚犯的子女是否在探视之间存在关联。

结论

探视后负面情绪的显着下降表明探视是监狱囚犯的一项有益活动；讨论了理论和实践结论。