Sykes argues that institutional aggression is a result of the environment, and that it is occurs within prison institutions because they experience deprivation on a daily basis. These include deprivation of liberty, where the prisoners are deprived of their freedom, deprivation of autonomy, where the prisoners are deprived of their independence by constantly being controlled by officers and loss of security, where many of the prisoners feel insecure of themselves. This is then supported by Sykes who found that the potential threat to personal security increased the anxiety levels in inmates, even if the majority of prisoners were not a threat to them. However, inmates may cope with these struggles in a number of ways, including some prisoners isolating themselves in their cells, whereas others choose to rebel by being violent towards staff. A study supporting the deprivation model was carried out by McCorkle et al who found that overcrowding, lack of privacy and lack of meaningful activities leads to peer violence which shows that the environment and place, could be a significant factor influencing aggression within prisoners.
These inmate subcultures contain distinctive languages and sets of informal norms, attitudes, beliefs, values, statuses, and roles that give prisoners a different perspective from people on the outside, or those of us in “the free world” (law.jrank.org, 2009). It is within these subcultures, that those who kill are respectable people and those who run drugs and partake in gang violence, are of important roles and statuses within the prison society. They have their own set of values known as an inmate code that those who belong to the subculture live by. This code alone depicts prison as a “chaotic, violent, and predatory jungle,” (Krestev, n.d.). Since many of the values held by the inmates of these subcultures, are much different than those held by society, many inmates find themselves attempting to adjust to new norms, rules, and expected patterns of behavior, which in many experiences, includes violent behavior.
These early prisons were designed to hold inmates in large open rooms, which made it difficult to keep control of the inmates. The prisons faced uprisings and attempted escapes. Concern for public safety was the main reason these prisons were closed. The new prisons designers were to ensure separation of inmates and offer reformation opportunities. Auburn state prison and Eastern penitentiary were built.
Sexual coercion is expressed in many forms such as being harmless or violent. Having sexual coercion in the prisons is a problem. No one really knows how far sexual assault is taken in the prison facility. Some inmates live in fear of telling someone they have been assaulted. They don’t want to become known as the “snitch”.
Overcrowding aggravates the natural conflicts that rely within the prison walls which then escalate violence. When working with criminals on an ongoing basis, it may cause corruption to occur with some of the inmates within the institution that ends up allowing drugs and weapons into the facility degrading it’s performance. The internal environment of a prisons primary influence towards management and custody include the following, the inmate social culture, the prisons physical environment, and prison staff culture. Then the external environment interacts with the internal environment that also influences management and custody by the following, the civil service department, which makes the rules for employees, employee organizations, and unions, which represent their members interests, rehabilitation advocates, such as those sponsoring particular behavioral science, educational, or religious interventions inside the prison. Prison environment changes can be in the rational and economic view, in which material rewards controls are provided in the direction people are in need of it.
In 1960s America there were many concerns about the treatment of prisoners by prison guards. Many complaints were made by prisoners of violent and brutal attacks by the guards that were meant to be protecting and caring for them. Zimbardo wanted to find out exactly what made prison guards behave in this way, and in particular was it the situation they found themselves in (referred to as situational factors) or the personalities of the guards (referred to as dispositional factors). In other words, did the guards behave violently because the rigid power-based social structure within the prison made them behave that way (situational), or because they had aggressive and sadistic personalities that led them to choose to become prison guards (dispositional)? Zimbardo aimed to investigate the difference between situational and dispositional factors in social roles by creating a mock prison in the basement of Stanford University.
Personality Traits of a Police Officer Most police officer’s have a personality trait. These personality traits are that of authoritarianism, suspicion, hostility, insecurity, conservatism, and cynicism. These traits define what type of an officer he or she may be and how they handle life inside and outside of the station. Authoritarianism is where one feels the need to be authoritive to control situations. A police officer tends to be authoritive because of the constant danger he or she is in while on the job.
However, this has had more disadvantages than advantages, the main advantage being the induced fear in people of committing a crime with the thought that they will be caught and it won't be pretty afterwards. Disadvantages of new prisons however are a little more complex, because each has a purpose, a conflict, and a possible resolution. A good reference article about these kinds of prison, including life inside a prison, is detailed in the article of "Why Prisons Don't Work", by Wilbert Rideau. Rideau takes an admiring step into describing their problem and its relation into life and social perspective. Let’s take for instance the first situation he presents.
It deteriorated into something that caused even the moderator himself to begin to internalize and identify with his new role of warden. All participants behaved in a manner they thought was required of them and obviously ignored or declined to use their own judgment in any given situation. All reactions were dictated by the situational needs not individual value systems or moral dilemma. The micro prison society that they created dictated their actions despite being viewed as inappropriate, evil or excessive. As their prison society evolved, their roles adjusted accordingly thus giving credence to Dr. Zimbardo’s assertion that “prison abuse is situational and structurally
Prison Comparison Contrast Carlita Jones University of Phoenix CJA 234 A penitentiary is a facility that confines the most horrific criminals to keep them out of society in an effort to punish and at the same time, keep society safe from these criminals. Inside a penitentiary is another world completely separate from the rest of the world. Most people dread the thought of ever ending up there, others never thought about it much, and some people cannot wait to go there, like gang members earning their stripes. The ideal penitentiary is always far from reality. An ideal penitentiary would punish without violence, although sometimes violence is part of the punishment for some.