This study tested the hypothesis that exposure to a violent prison context directly increases maladjustment among the inmate population and that exposure to a violent prison context moderates the relationships between individual-level risk and protective factors and maladjustment.
The importance of prison safety has generated a number of studies of the correlates to inmate maladjustment, and researchers have found that both individual and environmental characteristics impact the level of maladjustment across prisons; however, no studies have examined the impact of exposure to a violent prison context on maladjustment. The current study analyzed data collected from a national sample of inmates confined in state prisons. It found that exposure to violent prison contexts is associated with higher rates of inmate maladjustment, and it determined that exposure to a violent prison context moderates the relationships between individual-level risk and protective factors and some indicators of maladjustment. (Publisher abstract modified)