Criminal Justice Involvement, Drug Use, and Depression Among African American Children of Incarcerated Parents

Abstract

The incarcerated population in the United States is disproportionately African American and many inmates are parents of children under the age of 18. Recent reports show that African American children were significantly more likely than White children to have a parent in prison. Emerging research has also begun to investigate some of the effects that parental incarceration can have on children, but little has focused exclusively on the population of African American youth. This study draws on the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health to examine how having a father, a mother, or both parents incarcerated may be associated with an array of adverse life circumstances (i.e., criminal justice contact, drug use, and depression) for African American children. Differences were examined among children who had (a) an imprisoned mother, (b) an imprisoned father, (c) both parents imprisoned, and (d) neither parent imprisoned. Results indicated that having different parents imprisoned early in life was differentially associated with negative outcomes during emerging adulthood. These findings have important implications for the development of prevention and intervention programs for African American children of incarcerated parents.

Early age at childhood parental incarceration and STI/HIV-related drug use and sex risk across the young adult lifecourse in the US: Heightened vulnerability of black and Hispanic youth

“…The current study supports evidence suggesting parental incarceration may influence substance use risk (Kopak and Smith-Ruiz, 2015; Roettger et al, 2011) and expands our understanding of the potential effects of parental incarceration by documenting the link to sexual risk behavior and STI. Our group has documented incarceration impacts the risk not only of those who have been incarcerated but also that of their primary committed partners, and findings suggest incarceration likely has influences on the STI/HIV risk of the larger social and sexual network (Khan et al, 2009a; Khan et al, 2011; Khan et al, 2008).…”

“…Parental incarceration may have particularly important implications for non-white children due to the marked racial/ethnic disparity in incarceration; though blacks comprise only 13% of the US population (United States Census Bureau, 2015) half of children who have an incarcerated parent are black (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2010). There is an established relationship between parental incarceration and substance use (Kopak and Smith-Ruiz, 2015; Murray et al, 2012; Roettger et al, 2011), and, though less well researched, sexual risk behavior during adolescence (Nebbitt et al, 2014; Whalen and Loper, 2014) and adulthood (Hillis et al, 2001; Hillis et al, 2000) and HIV infection in adulthood (Lee et al, 2013). An important gap in the extant literature however is knowledge of how the age of the child during a parental incarceration influences risk.…”

“…This could be particularly important considering that black and Hispanic youth are populations disproportionately affected by both incarceration (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2015) and STI/HIV (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2014a, 2015a). Recent evidence of the strong association between parental incarceration and marijuana use among black youth highlights the need to examine associations by race (Kopak and Smith-Ruiz, 2015). …”

The Impact of Maternal Incarceration on Emotional and Behavioral Outcomes: Research Findings from a National Longitudinal Study on Adolescent Health

“…Parental incarceration groups in this study also used drugs at an earlier age compared to those who did not experience the incarceration of a parent. Lastly, [9] work showed that the children of incarcerated parents were more than 3 times as likely to qualify for substance use disorders by late adolescence as those who did not have a parent incarcerated.…”

“…Hence, children are more likely to depend on drugs as a method to cope with the shame associated with having a parent incarcerated [9] [21]. Analyses of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health), determined that having a father incarcerated increased the frequency of marijuana use by a factor of 1.77 for male children and a factor of 1.75 for female children [21].…”