The Impact of a Parent in Prison
Family members of incarcerated individuals are often referred to as "hidden victims" of the criminal justice system who are neither acknowledged nor given a platform to be heard. These hidden victims receive little personal support and do not benefit from the systemic societal mechanisms generally available to direct crime victims, despite their prevalence and their similarities to direct crime victims.
Children whose parents are involved in the criminal justice system, in particular, face a host of challenges and difficulties: psychological strain, antisocial behavior, suspension or expulsion from school, economic hardship, and criminal activity. It is difficult to predict how a child will fare when a parent is intermittently or continually incarcerated, and research findings on these children's risk factors are mixed.
However, research suggests that the strength or weakness of the parent-child bond and the quality of the child and family's social support system play significant roles in the child's ability to overcome challenges and succeed in life. Therefore, it is critical that correctional practitioners develop strong partnerships with law enforcement, public schools, and child welfare agencies to understand the unique dynamics of the family in question and try to ensure a safety net for the child and successful re-entry for the incarcerated parent.
Scope of the Problem
The massive increase in incarceration in the United States has been well publicized. In the 1970s, there were around 340,000 Americans incarcerated; today, there are approximately 2.3 million.[3] One consequence of this dramatic increase is that more mothers and fathers with dependent children are in prison. Since the war on drugs began in the 1980s, for example, the rate of children with incarcerated mothers has increased 100 percent, and the rate of those with incarcerated fathers has increased more than 75 percent.[4]
Current estimates of the number of children with incarcerated parents vary. One report found that the number of children who have experienced parental incarceration at least once in their childhood may range from 1.7 million to 2.7 million.[5] If this estimate is on target, that means 11 percent of all children may be at risk.[6] The rate of parenthood among those incarcerated is roughly the same as the rate in the general population: 50 percent to 75 percent of incarcerated individuals report having a minor child.[7]
Relying as we often do on a few statistics to describe a national phenomenon, we can easily be misled to believe that all segments of the population equally share the burden of parental incarceration. A closer examination of the numbers, however, reveals that communities of color are more at risk: Data from 2007 (the most recent data available) show that African-American children and Hispanic children were 7.5 times more likely and 2.3 times more likely, respectively, than white children to have an incarcerated parent.[8] Also, 40 percent of all incarcerated parents were African-American fathers.[9]The burden of parental incarceration on these communities has changed over time. For example, about 15 percent of African-American children born in the 1970s had a parent who was incarcerated. Twenty years later, the rate had nearly doubled to 28 percent.[10]
Unfortunately, parental incarceration is only one of a series of separations and stressful situations facing children whose parent is involved in the criminal justice system. If we consider the full continuum of the criminal justice process — arrest, pre-trial detention, conviction, jail, probation, imprisonment, and parole — the number of children affected is significantly larger. For example, if we include parents who have been arrested, the estimate of affected children rises to 10 million.[11] Although research to date has focused more on children with incarcerated parents than on children with parents in other phases of the system, the two groups may share many of the same risk factors and needs. Policymakers and practitioners must understand these characteristics to develop effective systemic responses.
This article summarizes the range of risk factors facing children of incarcerated parents. It also cautions against universal policy solutions that seek to address these risk factors but do not take into account the child's unique needs, the child's relationship with the incarcerated parent, and alternative support systems.Currently, there are around 2.7 million children with at least one parent in jail or prison. If y story is not unique but rather a tragic experience shared by about 2.7 million children with an incarcerated parent in a U.S. jail facility. If formerly incarcerated people are accounted for, then approximately 5 million children in the United States have experienced parental incarceration at some point in their childhood. In perspective, about 2 million people are incarcerated in the U.S. carceral system. Altogether, 7% of American children are estimated to experience parental incarceration and absence at some point in their childhood. This absence is so damaging that a UC Irvine studyclaims parental incarceration may be worse than experiencing parental death or divorce. Nonetheless, the impact of parental incarceration cannot be reduced to statistics when it finds its deep root in social and economic injustice experienced at a very intimate level.
These injustices include the stigmatization among children of incarcerated parents, which translates to low-self esteem and anxiety. In many instances, families socially withdraw from their communities to protect themselves from negative interactions, which further exacerbates the risk of antisocial behavior among COIP. Consequently, the lingering risk of antisocial behavior negatively affects their success, such as attending college (Shaw, 2019). A Georgetown study suggests generational wealth is frequently the best indicator of success in life; many who are not born into generational wealth turn to college as a tool to climb the socioeconomic ladder. Consequently, if the chances of COIP to attend college are already reduced, and they grow up underprivileged, then COIP are systematically trapped within the confines of poverty.
Children of incarcerated parents often face an immediate threat of poverty by a lack of stable housing and parental income. Hence, the likelihood of providing other essential support for positive youth development – tutoring, counseling, and childcare – is a stretch when 2 out 3 families cannot meet basic living needs. These challenges remain pervasive in the successive years of a parent’s incarceration in the form of collateral consequences. Collateral consequences include parents being less likely to secure housing or a job due to their conviction records, directly impacting the child’s long-term housing and financial stability. As a result, families are pushed into communities weighed down by inadequate resources, such as bad public schools, poor infrastructure, and overpoliced communities.
While structural barriers are persistent, children of incarcerated parents develop the resilience to combat the unjust consequences of our legal system. Many are at a socioeconomic disadvantage, yet their empathy and ability to overcome adversity is a source of inspiration to the rest of us. Some become the first to graduate high school in their family; some attend college and never come into contact with the justice system. These are all significant barriers they are shattering to courageously circumvent the generational consequences of their parents coming into contact with the system. Their stories are important because they uplift others who feel unseen and realize they are worthy of their dreams.
Many children cannot properly express these traumas and carry unhealed wounds into adulthood. Nonetheless, if these children land in trouble as adults, we quickly point fingers at their upbringing, absent parents, and communities; instead, we should step back and reckon: what happened to this person as a child? And what did we do collectively to alleviate the burden of their trauma? Our collective ignorance to place blame on individuals fails to take accountability for our responsibility towards COIP. Ultimately, it only reinforces an ever-ending curse that keeps entire families cycling in and out of the carceral system.
Criminal justice reform has hovered mainly around prison and sentencing reform. Policymakers should consider means to reduce the financial burden placed on families of children of incarcerated parents, especially to support their children during or post-incarceration. Prisons can establish work programs allowing incarcerated people to support their children financially.
Politicians often beat the drum of building a better America for children. Yet, the same politicians support draconian drug laws and harsh sentencing requirements that separates many children from their parents. In this process, our justice system wipes out childhoods, inflicts generational trauma, and tears apart families. We need to reexamine laws and policies that predetermine the fate of children of incarcerated parents before they even get a fair shot at life. Elected officials must support policies that uplift these children, protect their childhood, and recognize them as more than just collateral damage. A just legal system in a functioning democracy must ensure children of incarcerated parents can be kids.
Sources:
Barnes-Proby, Dionne, et al. “Programs for Incarcerated Parents.” RAND Corporation, 8 Feb. 2022, www.rand.org.
Bryant, Erica. “More Than 5 Million Children Have Had an Incarcerated Parent.” Vera, 7 May 2021, www.vera.org.
Coronado, Isabel. “A New Federal Grant to Ensure That Children of Incarcerated Parents Flourish.” Next100, 1 Mar. 2021, thenext100.org.
Hess, Abigail. “Georgetown Study: ‘To Succeed in America, It’s Better to Be Born Rich than Smart.’” CNBC, 29 May 2019, www.cnbc.com.
Hughes, Julia. “Quest for Democracy and ACA 8: Prisoners Paid as Little as 64 Cents a Day.” CJCJ, 27 July 2023, www.cjcj.org.
Murray, Joseph, and David P. Farrington. “The Effects of Parental Imprisonment on Children.” Crime and Justice, vol. 37, no. 1, 2008, pp. 133 – 206. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.1086/520070. Accessed 09 Aug. 2023.
Saneta deVuono-Powell, Chris Schweidler, Alicia Walters, and Azadeh Zohrabi. Who Pays? The True Cost of Incarceration on Families. Oakland, CA: Ella Baker Center, Forward Together, Research Action Design, 2015.
Shaw, M. (2019). The Reproduction of Social Disadvantage Through Educational Demobilization: A Critical Analysis of Parental Incarceration. Critical Criminology, 27(2), 275 – 290. doi.org.
“In Their Words: 4 Young People Share Experiences with Having an Incarcerated Parent.” Children of Incarcerated Parents, youth.gov. Accessed 09 Aug. 2023.
“Parental Incarceration Can Be Worse for a Child than Divorce or Death of a Parent.” American Sociological Association, 28 Sept. 2022, www.asanet.org.
Wagner, Peter, and Wendy Sawyer. “Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie 2023.” Prison Policy Initiative, 14 Mar. 2023, www.prisonpolicy.org.
“What Are Collateral Consequences?” National Inventory of Collateral Consequences of Criminal Conviction, niccc.nationalreentryresourcecenter.org. Accessed 09Aug. 2023.