EFFORTS TO MEASURE IMPACT OF INSTITUTIONAL STAY

In spite of great improvements in the programmes of correctional institutions for adults and juveniles, there are still no feasible ways of measuring the impact of institutional stay on the inmate. Outcome on after-care and out come after expiration of sentence, say a year or more after release, appears to be almost completely unrelated to the impact of the institutional programme. The reasons for this are that post-institutional outcome depends very much upon the type of environment to which the releasee returns, the personality of the releasee, the releasee's involvement with associates, and the readiness of the after-care officer or the police to take the releasee into custody. When the latter happens, failure is recorded. Another important factor is the size of the correctional institution. In our present thinking, the smaller the institution, the more chance for positive impact of institutional stay. Still another important item is the quality of staff, particularly of those staff members who have the closest and most frequent contacts with inmates. A staff member selected on the basis of his ability to develop relationships with institutionalized persons has a good chance of exerting a positive influence, especially when he has to supervise only a small number of inmates (say 20). Initial Efforts in Studying Impact The senior author for almost a generation has been interested in the discovery of ways and means to assess the effect of stay in a correctional institution on the inmate. (Reckless, 1942). Several of his doctoral students as well as his colleagues attempted to obtain indications of impact of institutional stay on inmates. (Reckless, 1955). Insights were obtained from observations of correctional institutions for youth in England and in Europe. (See Reckless,