Psychological punishment

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Psychological punishments are punishments that aim to cause mental pain or discomfort in order to punish an individual. Psychological punishments are usually designed to cause discomfort or pain through creating negative emotions such as humiliation, shame and fear within an individual or by depriving the individual of sensory and/or social stimulation.

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Some methods of corporal punishment, such as public flagellation, are designed to have the effects of psychological punishment as a secondary effect to the main punishment and as such the two methods can and are combined. Historically there has not been a distinct separation of pure psychological punishment without an element of physical harm as a formal type of punishment.

Psychological punishments that are particularly cruel and severe may be regarded as psychological torture - for example, the United Nations has stated that placing someone in solitary confinement for periods exceeding 15 consecutive days constitutes torture. [1]

Methods of psychological punishment include:

Aims and effects of psychological punishment

Individual

Punishments aim to alter behaviour considered defective or undesirable by trying to associate the behaviour with the feelings caused by an unpleasant stimulus through a process called operant conditioning. [2] [3] Following a behaviour that is deemed undesirable an unpleasant stimulus will be administered to the individual who carried out the behaviour in order to try and induce a negative emotional response. [3] Once the association between the behaviour and unpleasant stimulus is made the individual should learn that the outcome of a behaviour will result in an unpleasant set of emotions or feelings that outweigh the benefits gained by the undesirable behaviour and this should cause the punished individual to cease the behaviour. [2] [3] Within the context of psychological punishment the unpleasant stimulus relates to the method of punishment intended to have unpleasant psychological effects upon the punished individual.

Punishments involving public humiliation may also seek to ostracise the punished individual from society by labelling the individual as a 'deviant' or untrustworthy which would tarnish their reputation therefore making life within that society harder for them and serving as an additional long-term effect of the punishment. [4] [5] Recovering social status or dignity following a publicly humiliating punishment can be very difficult resulting in a lesser place within the social hierarchy if not an inability to reintegrate within the society resulting in social exclusion. [5] In the past or in undeveloped societies where one has to rely on social support for survival or advancement in life, becoming an outcast could be an effective death sentence and it removes the 'safety-net' that a society can provide whilst potentially making the individual a target for crime or exclusion from social events. [5] [6] Due to changing public opinions the feature of public humiliation in punishments is now very rare. [4]

Wider society

Punishment may be used to deter potential future offenders by showing them what the consequences of breaking the societal rules may be and encourage conformity to the norms within the society. Through vicarious learning one may see the outcome of a behaviour and decide whether or not they want to repeat the same behaviour based on the outcomes that they have observed therefore allowing them to determine whether or not the behaviour may be worthwhile without needing to carry out and incur the cost of the action themselves. [7] Should someone observe someone that they may be modelling, or thinking about modelling, their behaviour off of being punished the desire to replicate the same behaviour may be counteracted by the suppressive effects of the potential negative outcomes of the action therefore discouraging the person from proceeding with the action. [8] This is part of the reason why, historically, some punishments have been particularly brutal in order to have a greater deterrent effect - notable examples of this include the executions of Balthasar Gérard or Guy Fawkes. As humans can learn vicariously through observing other people punishment can make for a highly useful tool to deter undesirable behaviour and encourage following social norms.

Ensuring the vicarious effects of punishment are maximised may be done by increasing the social presence of the punishment. Punishments have historically been conducted in public places such as town squares in order to maximise the social presence of the punishment and ensure that word of the punishment could spread in a time before mass media existed. Conducting the punishment in public also helps the society in which it is occurring label the individual being punished as a 'deviant' or untrustworthy individual promoting the exclusion of the individual from society further reinforcing the need for people to conform to the societies norms in order to remain part of the society. [5]

Modern psychological punishments

Solitary confinement

Defined by the United Nations as "the confinement of prisoners for 22 hours or more a day without meaningful human contact" solitary confinement is one of the most prevalent psychological punishments used in western countries with there being at least 80,000 prisoners in the United States being held in solitary confinement alone. [9] Depending on country, prisoners may be subjected to solitary confinement at the discretion of prison guards and it is the most severe non-capital punishment one can receive. [9] [10]

Efficacy

Solitary confinement is a controversial punishment that some claim to be ineffective at preventing undesirable behaviour in prisoners in addition to being inhuman. [1] [9] Research has suggested that the efficacy of short-term exposure to solitary confinement upon violent inmates is rather limited with it appearing that no significant differences in behaviour between inmates sent to solitary confinement and those who were not. [11] Additionally it has been a well documented that long-term exposure to solitary confinement (or similar conditions) can lead to a variety of mental health issues including self-harming, depression, anger and hypersensitivity which severely impacts the prisoners ability to reintegrate into society once their sentence is complete. [12]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Social control</span> Concept within the disciplines of the social sciences and within political science

Social control is a concept within the disciplines of the social sciences. Social control is described as a certain set of rules and standards in society that keep individuals bound to conventional standards as well as to the use of formalized mechanisms. The disciplinary model was the forerunner to the control model.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Punishment</span> Imposition of an undesirable or unpleasant outcome

Punishment, commonly, is the imposition of an undesirable or unpleasant outcome upon a group or individual, meted out by an authority—in contexts ranging from child discipline to criminal law—as a response and deterrent to a particular action or behavior that is deemed undesirable or unacceptable. It is, however, possible to distinguish between various different understandings of what punishment is.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shame</span> Affect, emotion, cognition, state or condition

Shame is an unpleasant self-conscious emotion often associated with negative self-evaluation; motivation to quit; and feelings of pain, exposure, distrust, powerlessness, and worthlessness.

In behavioral psychology, reinforcement is a consequence applied that will strengthen an organism's future behavior whenever that behavior is preceded by a specific antecedent stimulus. This strengthening effect may be measured as a higher frequency of behavior, longer duration, greater magnitude, or shorter latency.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Solitary confinement</span> Strict imprisonment form

Solitary confinement is a form of imprisonment in which the inmate lives in a single cell with little or no meaningful contact with other people. A prison may enforce stricter measures to control contraband on a solitary prisoner and use additional security equipment in comparison to the general population. Solitary confinement is a punitive tool within the prison system to discipline or separate disruptive prison inmates who are security risks to other inmates, the prison staff, or the prison itself. However, solitary confinement is also used to protect inmates whose safety is threatened by other inmates by separating them from the general population.

Social learning is a theory of learning process social behavior which proposes that new behaviors can be acquired by observing and imitating others. It states that learning is a cognitive process that takes place in a social context and can occur purely through observation or direct instruction, even in the absence of motor reproduction or direct reinforcement. In addition to the observation of behavior, learning also occurs through the observation of rewards and punishments, a process known as vicarious reinforcement. When a particular behavior is rewarded regularly, it will most likely persist; conversely, if a particular behavior is constantly punished, it will most likely desist. The theory expands on traditional behavioral theories, in which behavior is governed solely by reinforcements, by placing emphasis on the important roles of various internal processes in the learning individual.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Public humiliation</span> Form of punishment whose main feature is dishonoring or disgracing a person

Public humiliation or public shaming is a form of punishment whose main feature is dishonoring or disgracing a person, usually an offender or a prisoner, especially in a public place. It was regularly used as a form of judicially sanctioned punishment in previous centuries, and is still practiced by different means in the modern era.

Solitude is a state of seclusion or isolation, meaning lack of socialisation. Effects can be either positive or negative, depending on the situation. Short-term solitude is often valued as a time when one may work, think, or rest without disturbance. It may be desired for the sake of privacy. Undesirable long-term solitude may stem from soured relationships, loss of loved ones, deliberate choice, infectious disease, mental disorders, neurological disorders such as circadian rhythm sleep disorder, or circumstances of employment or situation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Prisoner abuse</span> Mistreatment of imprisoned people by authorities

Prisoner abuse is the mistreatment of persons while they are under arrest or incarcerated. Prisoner abuse can include physical abuse, psychological abuse, sexual abuse, torture, or other acts such as refusal of essential medication.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Deterrence (penology)</span>

Deterrence in relation to criminal offending is the idea or theory that the threat of punishment will deter people from committing crime and reduce the probability and/or level of offending in society. It is one of five objectives that punishment is thought to achieve; the other four objectives are denunciation, incapacitation, retribution and rehabilitation.

In operant conditioning, punishment is any change in a human or animal's surroundings which, occurring after a given behavior or response, reduces the likelihood of that behavior occurring again in the future. As with reinforcement, it is the behavior, not the human/animal, that is punished. Whether a change is or is not punishing is determined by its effect on the rate that the behavior occurs. This is called motivating operations (MO), because they alter the effectiveness of a stimulus. MO can be categorized in abolishing operations, decrease the effectiveness of the stimuli and establishing, increase the effectiveness of the stimuli. For example, a painful stimulus which would act as a punisher for most people may actually reinforce some behaviors of masochistic individuals.

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A prison, also known as a jail,gaol, penitentiary, detention center, correction center, correctional facility, lock-up, hoosegow or remand center, is a facility in which inmates are confined against their will and usually denied a variety of freedoms under the authority of the state as punishment for various crimes. Prisons are most commonly used within a criminal justice system: people charged with crimes may be imprisoned until their trial; those pleading or being found guilty of crimes at trial may be sentenced to a specified period of imprisonment. In simplest terms, a prison can also be described as a building in which people are legally held as a punishment for a crime they have committed.

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The 2013 California prisoner hunger strike started on July 8, 2013 involving over 29,000 inmates in protest of the state's use of solitary confinement practices and ended on September 5, 2013. The hunger strike was organized by inmates in long term solitary in the Security Housing Unit (SHU) at Pelican Bay State Prison in protest of inmates housed there that were in solitary confinement indefinitely for having ties to gangs. Another hunger strike that added to the movement started the week before in High Desert State Prison. The focus of the High Desert State Prison hunger strike was to demand cleaner facilities, better food and better access to the library.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Solitary confinement in the United States</span>

In the United States penal system, upwards of 20 percent of state and federal prison inmates and 18 percent of local jail inmates are kept in solitary confinement or another form of restrictive housing at some point during their imprisonment. Solitary confinement generally comes in one of two forms: disciplinary segregation, in which inmates are temporarily placed in solitary confinement as punishment for rulebreaking; and administrative segregation, in which prisoners deemed to be a risk to the safety of other inmates, prison staff, or to themselves are placed in solitary confinement for extended periods of time, often months or years.

Mentally ill people are overrepresented in United States jail and prison populations relative to the general population. There are three times more seriously mentally ill persons in jails and prisons than in hospitals in the United States. Scholars discuss many different causes of this overrepresentation including the deinstitutionalization of mentally ill individuals in the mid-twentieth century; inadequate community mental health treatment resources; and the criminalization of mental illness itself. The majority of prisons in the United States employ a psychiatrist and a psychologist. There is a general consensus that mentally ill offenders have comparable rates of recidivism to non-mentally ill offenders. Mentally ill people experience solitary confinement at disproportionate rates and are more vulnerable to its adverse psychological effects. Twenty-five states have laws addressing the emergency detention of the mentally ill within jails, and the United States Supreme Court has upheld the right of inmates to mental health treatment.

While studies have shown the effects of solitary confinement to be detrimental to some inmates, solitary confinement of women has particular consequences for women that may differ from the way it affects men. Solitary confinement rates for women in the United States are roughly comparable to those for men and about 20% of prisoners will be in solitary confinement at some point during their prison career.

Criminal justice reform addresses structural issues in criminal justice systems such as racial profiling, police brutality, overcriminalization, mass incarceration, and recidivism. Criminal justice reform can take place at any point where the criminal justice system intervenes in citizens’ lives, including lawmaking, policing, and sentencing.

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Prisoners' Justice Day is a solidarity movement that takes place annually on August 10. The movement began in Canada in 1974 in support of prisoners’ rights and to remember all the people who have died of unnatural deaths while incarcerated. The first Prisoners' Justice Day was held at the Millhaven Institution on August 10, 1975, on the first anniversary of Edward Nolan's death. In addition to a day of mourning, six prisoners took part in an eighteen-day hunger strike. In 1976, August 10 was recognized as a memorial day where prisoners would strike in opposition to the use of solitary confinement and to protest inmate conditions within the Prison System by going on a one-day hunger strike and refusing to work.

References

  1. 1 2 "The United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners" (PDF). United Nations. December 2015. Retrieved February 9, 2022.
  2. 1 2 Solomon, Richard L. (April 1964). "Punishment". American Psychologist. 19 (4): 239–253. doi:10.1037/h0042493 – via Ovid.
  3. 1 2 3 Lester, David (1979). "Modern Psychological Theories of Punishment and Their Implications for Penology and Corrections". Corrective and Social Psychiatry. 25: 81–85.
  4. 1 2 Shoemaker, Robert (2004), Devereaux, Simon; Griffiths, Paul (eds.), "Streets of Shame? The Crowd and Public Punishments in London, 1700–1820", Penal Practice and Culture, 1500–1900, London: Palgrave Macmillan UK, pp. 232–257, doi:10.1057/9780230523241_10, ISBN   978-1-349-43269-1 , retrieved 2022-02-15
  5. 1 2 3 4 Tarlow, Sarah; Battell Lowman, Emma (2018). Harnessing the Power of the Criminal Corpse. Cham: Springer International Publishing. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-77908-9. ISBN   978-3-319-77907-2. PMID   30044580. S2CID   189697998.
  6. ↑ Henrich, Joseph (2015). The Secret of Our Success : How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter. Princeton University Press. p. 188.
  7. ↑ Terlaak, Ann; Gong, Yan (2008-10-01). "Vicarious Learning And Inferential Accuracy in Adoption Processes". Academy of Management Review. 33 (4): 846–868. doi:10.5465/amr.2008.34421979. ISSN   0363-7425.
  8. ↑ Bandura, Albert; Ross, Dorothea; Ross, Sheila A. (December 1963). "Vicarious reinforcement and imitative learning". The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology. 67 (6): 601–607. doi:10.1037/h0045550. ISSN   0096-851X. PMID   14084769.
  9. 1 2 3 "Solitary Confinement in Great Britain: Still Harsh, But Rare | Solitary Watch". 19 January 2012. Retrieved 2022-02-16.
  10. ↑ "Solitary confinement facts". American Friends Service Committee. 2010-04-07. Retrieved 2022-02-16.
  11. ↑ Morris, Robert G. (March 2016). "Exploring the Effect of Exposure to Short-Term Solitary Confinement Among Violent Prison Inmates". Journal of Quantitative Criminology. 32 (1): 1–22. doi:10.1007/s10940-015-9250-0. ISSN   0748-4518. S2CID   42011841.
  12. ↑ Haney, Craig (November 30, 2001). "The Psychological Impact of Incarceration: Implications for Post-Prison Adjustment" . Retrieved February 1, 2022.


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