Evaluating the Efficacy of a Parenting Program for Incarcerated Mothers

• NCJ Number: 224583
• Journal: Prison Journal Volume: 88 Issue: 3 Dated: September 2008 Pages: 423-445
• Author(s): Jacquelyn L. Sandifer
• Date Published: September 2008
• Length: 23 pages
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Program/Project Evaluation
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This evaluation of the effectiveness of the parenting program at a Southern correctional institution for women focused on changes that occurred in inmate mothers’ parenting knowledge and skills.

Abstract

The four hypotheses that predicted an increase in the parenting knowledge and skills of participants who completed the course were supported. Test scores and comments show that participants increased their child-development knowledge. This knowledge should be useful for improving the mothers’ ability to recognize and allow age-appropriate, autonomous experiences that promote and teach their children responsible behavior. Participants also changed their views of corporal punishment, in that they became more aware of and willing to use discipline measures other than spanking or hitting. Other positive program effects were changed attitudes toward parent-child role reversal and increased empathetic awareness of their children’s needs. Although there was no statistical evidence of improvement on the communication scale, interviews with participants revealed increased knowledge about how to communicate with children. Interviews also revealed that inmates gave great importance to program visitation components that offered extended visitation opportunities with their children. The central purpose of the parenting program is to socialize inmate mothers who may not have developed the skills, attitudes, and behaviors that facilitate compliance with normative social behavior in general or may not have been acculturated into a parenting role. Both classroom instruction and an interactive component are included in the parenting program, which is designed to teach and develop parenting and relational skills that increase effective parenting and positive interaction between the inmate mothers and their children. A pretest-posttest nonequivalent comparison group quasi-experimental design was used to assess short-term change in knowledge after the 12-week parent education course. Scores were obtained from the 64 participants at Time 1 and Time 2, based on completion of 2 parenting inventories. 1 table and 64 references