VII. My Work as a Psychologist in Prison Text 1. Psychologists` Work in General

Psychologists study the human mind and human behavior. Research psychologists investigate the physical, cognitive, emotional or social aspects of human behavior. Psychologists in health service fields provide mental health care in hospitals, clinics, schools or private settings. Psychologists employed in applied settings such as business, industry, government or nonprofit organizations provide training, conduct research, design organizational systems and act as advocates for psychology.

Like other social scientists, psychologists formulate hypotheses and collect data to test their validity. Research methods vary with the topic under study. Psychologists sometimes gather information through controlled laboratory experiments or by administering personality, performance, aptitude, or intelligence tests. Other methods include observation, interviews, questionnaires, clinical studies and surveys.

Psychologists apply their knowledge to a wide range of endeavors, including health and human services, management, education, law and sports. They usually specialize in one of a number of different areas.

Answer the questions:

1. What do psychologists study?

2. In what organizations do psychologists work?

3. How do psychologists gather information?

4. Where can they apply their knowledge?

Take All PrisonersInside the fence

by Marisa Mauro, Psy.D.

Marisa Mauro, Psy.D., is a psychologist in private practice with a focus on forensics in Austin, Texas. Previously she worked as clinical psychologist at the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Much of her work there was focused on sex offenders, gang members, and inmates serving life sentences. She has also taught as an adjunct professor and conducted research on personality, academic success, career success, eating disorders, and suicide.  Her website is www.drmarisamauro.com

Text 2. Inside The Fence

Opening the heavy metal door to my cement block office the officer asks, "Hey Doc, are you ready for the first one?" With my overcoat still buttoned and heart racing, I nod. The conversation inside my head begins: What have I gotten myself into? Is that my heart? It's racing so fast I think I might faint. Slow down. Think. You can do this. You went to school for 10 years to do this for God's sake. Seconds later he is in front of me, hands clasped behind his back, dressed in an orange jumpsuit and looking unkempt. "Mam," he says, "may I sit?"

I motion to the chair. He sits, looking me straight in the eye. Silently I assess my escape route: Why is he seated closest to the door? My back is against the wall; the desk, separating us, blocks my quickest exit. I would need to squeeze my self between it and the wall to get out. And what about him? Surely he will stop me.

My thoughts are interrupted. "Mam," he says, "do you need this folder?"

"Yes," a voice that sounds like mine says, "and also your ID."

I begin to leaf through his medical file. Under the mental health section he has written "bipolarschizophrenic manic depressive."What? I am finding it hard to focus on the task at hand and instead my thoughts resume: I cannot believe I am sitting here, alone with this man. What has he done? Steal, murder, rape? How can I tell? Well, I know that whatever it is, it must be bad.

A loud alarm signaling distress elsewhere in the cavernous building interrupts my thoughts. Officers storm the hallway looking for the cause, "Get down!" they all scream. I look for my personal alarm and find it safely secured to my side. "I said get down!" I hear a male officer shout, and the man in front of me smiles and drops to the ground on his stomach, arms and legs spread on the cold and dirty floor.

My thoughts race: What have I gotten myself into? Do I really need this job? Maybe I am insane. I mean, who in their right mind would do this? Calm down; do not show your fear. He will sense it.

An officer enters, "All clear Doc," and motions to the patient on the floor to get up. He stands, and, as if nothing had happened, plops himself back into the chair facing my desk. Bewildered, I find my voice and begin my assessment, my voice shaky, "Have you ever been in a psychiatrichospital?" "Nope," he declares.

Minutes later it is over. He thanked me and left. I was alive! My heart slowed. Only eight hours and fifty short assessments later and my first day is complete.

I have since repeated hundreds of these days, albeit with ever growing self-controland confidence. I am a 28-year-old female psychologist working inside the fence, or better known as prison. Not up front in the shiny offices where the women wear skirts and 3-inch high heels, but inside, amongst the inmates. In case you're wondering, I wear trousers and frumpy shoes.

On that first day I treated the crime. Today, I acknowledge the crime and treat the person. And today, I love my work - working with patients everyone else has given up on.

In this blog, I will write about my unique experiences inside the fence. I hope to share my understanding of criminals, gangs, prison culture and forensic psychology. I hope you find this population as fascinating and perplexing as I do. Maybe you might even be encouraged to identify and help at-risk individuals before everyone gives up on them.

I have received some email inquires from my blog readers asking for more information about my job as a psychologist working in a prison. I thought that I would try and answer them here.

I presently work with some of our most challenging inmate-patients - those who are a danger to themselves, others or gravely disabled. This means that all of my current patients:                                                

1) Have active suicidalideation, intent or plans 2) Have homicidal ideation, intent or plans to hurt others, or 3) As a result of a mental disorder, are not making using of food, clothing shelter, or other activities of daily living even though all of those items are made available.

My daily routine involves completing rounds, seeing each of these patients and determining whether or not their level of care should be stepped down or if they should be discharged and returned to the hands of custody officers. In conjunction with my team, I also determine whether or not the condition is severe or chronic enough to warrant a referral to the Department of Mental Health. At this level of care, some interesting things happen. It is not unusual for a patient to be observed smearing or throwing his feces, to spit on, yell at or threaten mental and medical healthcare staff. The other day, my patient successfully demonstrated how his voices could help him get out of his handcuffs. Mind you, he was handcuffed for safety concerns only - I usually have them in my office uncuffed.

Below are some of my recent clinical responsibilities.

Mental Health Screening: Each inmate entering the State's prison system receives a quick mental health screening. This is a quick assessment designed to evaluate for major mental health disorders such as Bipolar Disorder,Schizophreniaand Major Depressive Disorder. The inmate is then given a screener for potential developmental delays. This is important because inmates with limitedcognitivefunctioning are at increased risk for victimization. They may also need a staff member to assist them with hearings, daily grooming, following directions and/or writing.

Emergency Duty: There are plenty of emergencies in prison. Psychologists and Psychiatrists are on call to respond to mental health crises. These may entail calls for suicidal ideation, homicidal ideation, grave disability, victimization, rape, major depression, mania,panicattacks,grief, break ups or death of a loved one. In addition, there is a strong prison culture part of which demands that there is ‘no crying in prison'. Inmates are only ‘allowed' to cry when their mom dies. Crying at any other time puts them at risk for harm by other inmates. Custody officers will refer an inmate as an emergency if he is caught crying or exhibiting other unusual or nonconforming behavior such as using racial slurs at targeted groups, poor hygiene, urinating in a common area, etc.

Psychological Intakes: Inmates who are referred to mental health receive an intake evaluation to determine whether or not they have a diagnosis needing treatment. These intakes are very similar to those used in community mental heath or private practice. If necessary, a treatment plan is created and referrals are provided.

Therapy:Individual and group therapy is available to inmates using mental health services. Many inmates suffer from hard to treat personalitydisorders, particularly Antisocial, Narcissistic, and Borderline Personality Disorders. Even more are coping with drugaddictionand polysubstance dependence. Some younger inmates or first time offenders suffer fromadjustment disorder. We see a variety of other disorders, particularly Bipolar I and II, Schizophrenia (Paranoid and Disorganized types), Schizoaffective Disorder,Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Substance Induced Psychotic Disorders and Major Depression. Personally, I conduct both individual and group therapy. I also still facilitate a group for inmates serving life in prison.

Court-Ordered Assessments: I have conducted court-ordered assessments from time to time. These assignments are from Judges seeking a psychologist's opinion as to a defendant's sentence - in short, a recommendation for prison or probation. Other court-ordered assessments seek recommendations for conditions of parole, i.e. Alcoholics Anonymous, therapy or parental visitation issues. A full psychological report is produced and submitted to the court.

Summary

Forensic psychology covers a great deal of ground, stretching into many areas including (but not limited to): cognitive psychology, as seen in the studies of eyewitness testimony, interview techniques, and social information processing accounts of violence; developmental psychology (which is critical for our understanding of delinquent development); and social psychology (which plays an important role in theories of criminal behaviour).

There are a number of factors that can influence the accuracy of eyewitness memory, and research into the accuracy of eyewitness testimony focuses on three areas: acquisition, retention and retrieval. Research has also been put to good use in assisting police in structuring witness interviews appropriately.

Sometimes people confess to crimes they did not commit, but there are important differences between voluntary and coerced confessions – in the case of coerced confessions, the suspect may even come to believe that their own memory for events is false.

During crime investigations, interviewers use a variety of techniques to enhance memory retrieval in witnesses. Some of these enable the process of retrieval from memory to take place in a similar psychological context to that in which the information was first recorded, while others encourage the witness to try to use many different paths to retrieve the information.

Even skilled questioners find it difficult to detect lies and deceit simply on the basis of a suspect’s verbal and non-verbal cues, so more advanced approaches are often needed.

Thanks to studies such as The Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development, we now know that there are factors present during childhood that can predict adult offending, and important influences over the lifespan that help to explain and characterize violent conduct.

Approaches to working with offenders have changed as our understanding of antisocial and criminal behaviour has developed, moving from psychodynamic psychotherapy, through group therapy, to behaviour modification, and a broad consensus has been reached regarding the characteristics of treatments that impact on offending.

Like all good psychologists (and perhaps unlike their depiction in the popular media), forensic psychologists are concerned with evidence (in terms of methodologies for gathering robust data and appropriate methods of analysis) upon which to base appropriate theories and practice.

Questions for discussion:

1.Are research findings from psychology sufficiently robust and reliable to be applied to real world problems such as crime?

2.‘There is nothing so practical as a good theory.’ Is this true in forensic psychology?

3.A great deal of psychological research points to the shortcomings in the reliability of eyewitness and confessional evidence. How might psychologists tackle this problem?

4.Is it really possible to understand the psychological characteristics of a criminal from crime scene evidence?

6.With reference to the findings from longitudinal studies, is it true that the causes of delinquency are to be found at the level of the individual?

7.Discuss the view that spending money to treat criminals is ‘morally wrong and a waste of public money’; instead, it has been suggested that criminals should be punished for their crimes.

Additional texts for translation

behaviorism

Learning is one of the major topics in psychology; behaviorism made it the central topic. Under the behaviorist point of view, every human behavior is learned, and every human being can be taught new behaviors. Watson was heavily influenced by the works of Ivan Pavlov. Subsequently, how learning was accomplished was the subject of many prominent psychologists, and many experiments with animals were carried out whose results where said to be transferable to humans. Among these scientists were Edward C. Tolman, Edward L. Thorndike, and Clark Hull. Their theories about learning were influential in the area of educational psychology.

The next psychologist of the behaviorist school to became a well-known figure was B. F. Skinner. Skinner brought forward a variant of behaviorism, called radical behaviorism, which took consciousness in consideration. He was the creator of a famous device to perform experiments with animals, called the Skinner box. In this box, a rat presses a lever, or a pigeon pecks a key to obtain some reward, thus permitting to uncover the principles of conditioning. He argued that language was a learned skill, acquired by action of the mechanisms of punishment and reward, and independent of genetic factors. In this view, he was at odds with another theorist, Noam Chomsky, who contended that no theory of learning could explain the acquisition of language. Skinner wrote a book where he advanced some ideas about society that were very controversial.

While in America the behaviorist movement was expanding, in Europe a new form of psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, had made its appearance with the publishing in 1900 of Sigmund Freud's The Interpretation of Dreams. A physician and neurologist, Freud founded his therapy in models of hydrodynamics that were developed at the end of the nineteenth century. He was more interested in the clinical treatment of patients than in the development of theoretical models. However, until his death he constantly updated his conceptual model, called psychodynamic psychology, according with the breakthroughs made at clinical work. He thus provided clinical psychologists with a scheme to frame their professional work, which encompassed the today widely known concepts of ego, id, and superego. Disciples of Freud who introduced variations to his theory were Carl Jung and Alfred Adler, among others. An invitation that G. Stanley Hall made to Freud to speak at Clark University marked the introduction of psychoanalysis in the United States.

As early as 1942, an alternative to behaviorism and psychoanalysis was brought out by Carl Rogers with his client-centered therapy. Rogers' proposal was part of a movement founded in the philosophical schools of phenomenology and existentialism, which received, among others, the names of "humanistic psychology" or the "third force." Two key concepts of humanistic psychology are the importance of self-concept (how it develops and how it affects behavior), and the idea of the person as growing towards the full expression of his potentialities. Mental disorders are caused by society hindering this natural development. Leading figures of this movement, related with the human potential movement of the 1960s and 1970s, were Abraham Maslow, Rollo May, and Fritz Perl.

Another approach to the study and treatment of emotional disorders is cognitive psychology, and its corresponding clinical branch, cognitive therapy. Behaviorism had banned all study of higher mental processes arguing that they were outside the scope of stimulus-response model. Cognitive psychology broke the prohibition and undertook the study of activities such as thinking, problem solving, and creativity, as well as returning to older subjects like memory and perception. Cognitive therapy, evolved mainly during the 1970s, assumes that mental disorders are caused by an ill conception of the world. The perceptions and beliefs of the patient are considered as the determinants of his emotions and behaviors. Leading cognitive therapists were Aaron Beck and Albert Ellis.

Ways to Deal with Difficult People

For those wondering how to deal with difficult people, remember that patience and understanding is the key. Read on to know more about dealing with difficult people at work place or in any other setting and situation.

Most of our problems in life are neither technical problems, nor economic problems, but they are mostly people problems, caused by difficult people! I am sure every one of us has come across numerous people who have made our life difficult at the workplace. In this article, I 'll give you some tips on handling difficult people at work.

Patience is the best remedy for every trouble. - Titus Maccius Plautus

There are many times when you cannot simply hold your patience and you lose your temper. This generally results in bad consequences which you regret facing. Most of such conditions arise because we just get into a fight with difficult people, at the workplace or in any other situation. Difficult people can be referred to as peers who irritate you by their behavior or a boss who is extraordinarily demanding. Such people can even be those who are experts in humorous insults and bad comments, start a fight for a simple reason, or even those who complain a lot and want everything done in their way. There are some very simple tips that will help you solve the problem of dealing with difficult people at workplace.

Tips on How to Deal with Difficult People

Think Before you Speak: The best method in avoiding a conflict with difficult people is to think before you speak a word or present a viewpoint. You first need to assess the results of what you are going to say, and then only decide whether it is better to speak. It is well said that if we learn to control our tongue, we can prevent most disputes.

Change your Attitude Temporarily: One of the good ways to deal with difficult people is to change your attitude temporarily. For avoiding conflicts with an annoying person, it is suggested to behave in a way which will seem appropriate for that person. On the other hand, you can behave in a normal way with other people. Try to adjust to the situation for ruling out possibilities of fights and disputes.

Appreciate Difficult People: Those thinking how to handle difficult peopleshould always appreciate such individuals. You can in no way avoid conflicts if you point out their negative points. It has been observed that if such people are appreciated, they do not seem 'difficult' at all. When it comes to dealing with intolerable employees, try to focus much on their positive points.

Do not be Personal and Share Secrets: When it comes to dealing with difficult people at the workplace, you should not be too personal with them and share your secrets. If they have nothing to talk bad about, there arises no question of conflicts. It is not that you should avoid unpleasant individuals at the office, but you should make sure you do not get too close to them.

Control your Anger and Frustration: Controlling anger and being patient is the key to handle difficult people. If you say or do something in an angry mood, you may have to face unfortunate situations further. Therefore, it is better to be silent and not share something that will provoke such people to get into a verbal fight.

Be Clear and Make Them Understand: If you are asking how do you deal with difficult people, remember to be clear and direct in your conversation. Make such people understand that a fact is a fact, and it will not change even if they think the other way. However, you need to be tactful in doing so, or it may lead to a conflict.

These are some simple tips on how to deal with difficult people. Do not take the behavior and responses of difficult people very personally. Also do not ever be under the impression that you can change such people. Whilehandling difficult people at work, you should consider corporate policies for creating and maintaining a healthy work environment.

eyewitness memory

One model that emerged from the early works described the three memory stages of (1) acquisition when memories are formed), (2) retention (holding them in storage) and (3) retrieval (fetching them from storage). While memory theory has moved on from this basic model, it is still useful in a discussion of eyewitness memory. Research into the accuracy of eyewitness testimony has focused on initial observation of the incident (acquisition), period between seeing and recalling (retention) and, finally, giving testimony (retrieval). Researchers have engaged with a wide range of relevant variables over a long period including: social variables, such as the status of the interrogator; situational variables, such as the type of crime; individual variables, such as witness age; and person identification interrogational variables, such as the type of questioning.

Eyewitness testimony is the evidence given by witnesses to a crime, typically in the form of a verbal account or person identification.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF CONFESSION

In law, a confession is exceptionally powerful evidence – an irrefutable admission of guilt. But while most confessions are true, some people have been known to ‘confess’ to a crime they did not commit. Gudjonsson (2003) offers a catalogue of cases in which people have been imprisoned for long periods, or even executed, on the basis of a false confession. In the UK these in famous cases include those of the ‘Guildford Four’ and ‘Birmingham Six’, two court cases from the mid 1970s, in which four and six innocent people respectively received long prison sentences based on evidence that included false confessions. How often such cases arise is impossible to know – matters of guilt and innocence are not always clear-cut, and the discovery of a mistake in sentencing can take years to come to light. Undoubtedly, some such errors never do.

Why people make false confessions, another issue raised by Münsterberg (1908), is a very ‘psychological’ question. A distinction has been drawn between two types of false confession – voluntary and coerced. Coerced false confession can be broken down further into two sub-types – coerced–compliant and coerced–

internalized false confessions.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF INVESTIGATION

THE COGNITIVE INTERVIEW

Iterviews are one of the most common ways of gathering information across a range of settings for a variety of reasons. In the context of crime investigation, there will be interviews with witnesses, suspects and victims, all conducted with various aims, including gathering evidence, cross-checking information and eliciting confessions. Interviewing children has become something of a speciality in its own right.

The less salubrious aspects of police interviewing have been highlighted by investigators of false confessions, but thereare other, more constructive, aspects of the interview process to consider. A technique known as the cognitive interview illustrates the application of psychology to facilitate investigative interviewing. A great deal of the research on eyewitness testimony points to the frailties of memory and questions the reliability of eyewitness evidence. The cognitive interview is an attempt to find a constructive solution to these problems and improve the accuracy

of eyewitness recall.

Fisher, McCauley and Geiselman (1994) describe how the original cognitive interview protocol, used by police officers, incorporated four techniques to enhance memory retrieval:

1. Context reinstatement – the witness is encouraged to recollect aspects of the situational context (such as sights and sounds at the time of the event and relevant personal factors, such as how they felt and what they were thinking at the time of the incident).

2. Report everything – the witness engages in perfectly free recall, unconstrained by focused (and potentially leading) questioning, or self-censoring of what is reported. The theory underpinning these two techniques lies in the contextual similarity between encoding and retrieval. So if the process of retrieval from memory can take place in a similar psychological context to that in which the information was encoded, the witness should have facilitated access to stored memories, improving the accuracy and completeness of recall.

3. Reverse order – the witness is encouraged to begin their description of an event from different starting points (such as a mid-point), or to start at the end and work backwards to the beginning.

4. Change perspective – witnesses are encouraged try to give an account of the event from the point of view of another person, such as another witness or the victim.

Techniques 3 and 4 are intended to encourage witnesses to try to use many different paths to retrieve information from memory. If memories are stored as networks of associations, increasing the number of retrieval points should lead to more complete recall of the original event.

As the research and practice base developed, so the protocols or the cognitive interview expanded to include, for example, a broader range of specific questioning techniques and the use of guided imagery. A body of evaluation studies, conducted in both laboratory and field settings, has accumulated since 1984. According to Milne and Bull (1999), the weight of evidence shows that the cognitive interview elicits more correct (that is, truthful) information than other types of interview. While there are some reservations, the technique is generally well received by police officers and has become widely used. Furthermore, recent research suggests that it is a reliable and helpful technique with child witnesses.