Assessment and Treatment of Offenders:
This journal talks about how difficult it is for prisoners to get help and be rehabilitated when they are released. It goes over how whenever any type of prisoner asks for help either from the prison medical staff or even a psychologist they are brushed off as if it doesn’t matter what they’re feeling because of the crime they had committed. This problem causes the majority of prisoners to reoffend and end back in confinement. According to the National Insitute of Justice (2020), there are donations to help rehabilitation programs for prisoners but the statistic states that the average year and percentage a prisoner is rearrested after release; 68% within 3 years, 79% within 6 years, and 83% within 9 years (Bloom, 2021, Bradshaw, 2021).
The challenges weren’t exactly towards the staff but towards the prisoners instead. Staff members have been known to misuse Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) that had been set in place to help prisoners rehabilitate (Beck & Haigh, 2014). With prison staff members not using their resources correctly this makes inmates either become reserved or more violent due to them feeling as if no one in the system cares enough to help them. Sadly this is common since most people in those positions don’t believe that inmates can change and become a better version of themselves.
In Pope and Vasquez’s (n.d) they go over questions to ask yourself when it comes to problems. Incorporating their theory into this journal is that the problem is how CBT is not being used properly or any of the resources given, the prisoners are the ones that are affected by the misuse, and the prisoners are also the clients in this situation. The way prison staff could begin the process of helping rehabilitation be more effective with prisoners is to begin to listen to what they need to say instead of dismissing it, once they begin that one step the process will begin to make an impact. The beginning of an inmate’s rehabilitation is taken seriously they will then be able to regulate their emotions and understand what resources they can use once they have been released especially if someone in their life can set them back.
References:
Bloom, T., & Bradshaw, G. A. (2022). Inside of a prison: How a culture of punishment prevents rehabilitation. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 28(1), 140–143. https://doi.org/10.1037/pac0000572Links to an external site.
Pope, K. S., & Vasquez, M. J. T. (n.d.). Steps in ethical decision-making.Links to an external site. https://kspope.com/memory/ethics.php
