Predicting the Prison Misconducts of Women Offenders - Article Review Example

The needs and preferences of most women offenders may be deemed to be qualitatively dissimilar than those of male offenders. The gender-responsive and pathways outlooks of female offending in most recent have garnered a lot of attention in both scholarly and practitioner arenas. The perspective linked to pathways has focused most of its attention to effects and co-occurrence of dysfunctional relationships, substance abuse, trauma and mental illness directed to women offending. The gender-responsive also suggest that few problems that are related to self-concept issues, childcare and parenting are such significance to the needs associated with the ladies offenders. The aim or purpose of this article is to highlight the importance of gender-responsive needs for women's prisons. Hence, this article tried to answer the research question which states that; why are most women offenders more likely than their male counterparts to be victims of physical and sexual abuse, abuse of the substance, exhibit problems associated with mental health, encounter problems of childcare and be most affected by relationship issues?

The article puts into use the Missouri Women's Risk Assessment tool. The tool is associated with specific questions concerning woman's history, parenting issues, relationships, mental health concerns and substance abuse or use. The researchers discovered that including of gender-responsive needs with the traditional classification of things is predictive of female offenders' misconduct. Equally, items like unsupportive relationships, childhood abuse, and depression or anxiety led to a high likelihood of a woman incurring misconduct in six to twelve months duration. Any female lacking sufficient support from outside prison faces a lot of tribulations in trying to adapt to the jail environment.

However, as much as the study exhibits a promise for the gender-responsive measure, it still has its limitations. There arises the issue of over-generalizing. The Assessment of Missouri Women's Risk scales is yet to be proven in other prisons around the world. Since the measures of misconducts were measured within six to twelve months, history could not exist on that alone. This topic has been dealt by other researchers widely. Van Voorhis claims that other researchers dug deeply in assessing the validity of tools likes LSI-R and COMPAS that is entitled in recommending the supplement of the gender-neutrality. The findings of this study are open to future corrections as much as its objectivity is to be achieved since it is true that no study is perfect. The researchers still have to confirm if the results of the study can be used on a generalized pollution.

References

Wright, E. M., Salisbury, E. J., & Van Voorhis, P. (2007). Predicting the prison misconducts of women offenders: The importance of gender-responsive needs. Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 23(4), 310-340.