Forensic Psychology In Penitentiary Facilities

Forensic psychology in penitentiary facilities

Introduction.

Psychological evaluation and adaptation processes

The environmental characteristics of penitentiary establishments (overcrowding, unhealthiness conditions, abuse, practical of deformed values, violence in general) constitute risk factors that cause physical and mental diseases that lead in the disorganization of the behavior of inmates and that They will intervene differently in the different inmates depending on their personality characteristics.

The process of adaptation and assimilation to the penitentiary environment, the restriction of behavior and unification of customs, uses, habits and culture is what is defined as the phenomenon of prison, the result of permanence in a penitentiary institution that is related to psychic and social consequences that would make future the social reintegration of inmates to future. The consequences varies according to the time of permanence in prison.

Developing.

The effects of prison is divided into three stages; The first consists of regressive, immature, anxious and unstable emotionally affectively in response to prison entry. Which gives the second stage: disorders of behavior, marked by aggressive behaviors, appearance of depressive affective deterioration or the presence of episodes related to anxiety disorders. Finally in the third stage, severe mental pathology appears, with psychotic outbreaks, severe affective disorders, abnormal experiential reactions or serious anxiety and maladjustment crises to prison.

According to Rincón and Manzanares, the effects of prisonization control several areas of the person: biological: related to the increase in the attack instinct since escape is not possible, problems to reconcile sleep, problems of sexual and sensory deprivation (vision, auditory , taste and olfactory); Psychological: Loss of self – esteem, deterioration of the image of the outside world due to monotonous and thorough life, accentuation of anxiety, depression, conformism, learned helplessness and dependence; and social: criminal pollution, family estrangement, extreme survival learning (lying, sorrow, etc.). However, the effects of prisonization can also be seen as forms of adaptation to the penitentiary environment.

Prisonization and its effects

Referring to the investigations of Echeverri, Medina, Cardona and Arcila and Salgado, the following environmental factors are indicated, effects of prisonization This cause: 

1. Anxiety
2. Denter 
3. Personalization loss 
4. Loss of intimacy
5. Self esteem
6.  Lack of control 
7. Absence of expectations 
8. Depression and suicide
9.  Drug and alcohol consumption.

The effects of prisonization in the confidence phase of the progressive method, taking as a investigation carried out by Castillo and Corrales on the psychological effects of imprisonment present in the process of social reintegration in the trust phase, in a sample of men belonging to the Central Penitentiary "The Hope" of El Salvador, the effects found were:

1. Emotional immaturity
2.  Aggressiveness
3. maladjustment to social norms and values, 
4. Paranoidism
5.  Distance in interpersonal relationships 
6. Difficulties in family relationships 
7. Uncertainty towards work activities 
8. Difficulties in the sexual area

Echeverri psychological adaptation to the penitentiary context is determined by three factors: age, cultural level and criminal trajectory, which allow the adaptive capacity prognosis. The factors related to penitentiary adaptation are: age, cultural level and trajectory. Psychological evaluation in the penitentiary context is framed in the criminal field through forensic psychology that performs the evaluation by using a series of instruments that have reliability and scientific validity.

Burgos For the evaluation of the psychological factors described above, the psychological evaluation in the penitentiary environment can rely on various strategies and instruments of evaluation: observation, interviews (structured or semi -structured), Forensic clinical psychological tests (test, scales, questionnaires and inventories ). In addition to procedures and techniques for assessing the risk of violence: unstructured, actuarial, and structured clinical.

conclusion.

This evaluation includes file review, files, protocols, testimony of sentence and the testimony of family and friends for the correlation of information. The evaluation is carried out at different times: income, permanence and discharge (Jiménez, 2009).

The evaluation instruments of greater use in the clinical and forensic context are psychological tests and interviews. It is important to highlight the interview application at first, while the administration of psychologies tests would be carried out after a few weeks until the inmate adapts to the penitentiary environment.