Longitudinal Perspectives on Mother-Child Separation Resulting from Incarceration

Drawing on two phases of a longitudinal qualitative study, this chapter explores the immediate and longer-term implications of maternal incarceration for children. Following an overview of the familial and societal context in which children experience maternal incarceration, the chapter reviews key findings from Siegel’s (Disrupted childhoods: Children of women in prison. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2011) Disrupted Childhoods: Children of Women in Prison, a study of 67 children with criminal justice-involved mothers. Then, drawing from follow-up interviews with 13 of the original child participants, the chapter examines the adult children’s views of the long-term effects of maternal incarceration. Now young adults ranging in age from 19 to 28, participants reflect back on the ways that maternal incarceration and reentry affected them as children, and they discuss how maternal incarceration, as well as other familial stressors, continues to shape their transition to adulthood.