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Overcrowding and InmateFatalitiesRICHARD H. ANSON aa Albany State CollegePublished online: 01 Sep 2011.

To cite this article: RICHARD H. ANSON (1984) Overcrowding and Inmate Fatalities,International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice, 8:1-2, 93-99, DOI:10.1080/01924036.1984.9688788

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INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF COMPARATIVE AND APPLIED CRIMINAL JUSTICE SPRING 1984, VOL. 8, NO. 1

Overcrowding and Inmate Fatalities

RICHARD H. ANSON Albany State College

A number of theorists have suggested that prison overcrowding produces greater tenden- cies toward violence and interpersonal aggression. Empirical studies of the effects of over- crowding on the prison population have been conducted on individual inmate buffer zones, or have focussed on specific institutions within a state or federal prison system.

This paper reevaluates the relationship between prison overcrowding and inmate vio- lence using official data reported for 5fty-one (N = 51) Departments of Corrections reported in the Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics.

Results of the analysis indicate that although overcrowding relates to the number of sui- cides and homicides in expected directions, these connections reverse themselves as indicators of inmate violence are translated into percentages of respective inmate populations.

The number of suicides reported explains a significant (Re = .27) portion of the variance in the number of homicides and clearly suggests that both forms of violence tend to occur together in state reporting areas.

Prison Overcrowding and Inmate Fatalities Ethological theory has explained animal aggression towards members of

their own species as the outcome of territorial invasions of interspatial im- peratives (Lorenz, 1966; Ardrey, 1966; Morris, 1967). These physical intrusions compromise ecological equilibrium in threatening sufficient quantities of food, water, and territory. Aggressive behavior, the theory holds, functions to de- fend these imperatives and contributes to the survival of the species.

Ethological conceptions of animal behavior have formed the bedrock of penological studies on inmate responses to the deprivations of imprisonment. A small number of experimental studies have sought to measure inmate inter- personal space and to correlate these physical dimensions to the probability of violence in prison. These studies have generally reported that violent inmates have larger body buffer zones than their nonviolent counterparts (Kinsel, 1970; Hildreth et al., 1971; Curran et al., 1978) and tend to misinterpret benevolent intrusions by the researcher as an attack on their personal safety (Kinsel, 1970).

Other studies have sought to examine the effects of institutional and prison overcrowding on inmate psychological and medical well-being. Overcrowding has been observed to relate to perceptions of overcrowding, loss of control, and negative changes in mood among residents of institutions (Aiello and Epstein, 1979; Baron et al., 1976; McCain et al., 1980). A selected number of these stud- ies have also demonstrated that overcrowding has a predictable relationship to psychological stress (Aiello and Epstein, 1979; Baron et al., 1976), complaints of illness, and the general health of non-inmate residents (Levy and Herzog, 1974).

Some published research has refined analysis of the effects of inmate over- crowding on specific areas of the prison. The bulk of these investigations have

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94 RICHARD ANSON

revealed that overcrowding in open dormitory settings produces adverse changes in inmate blood pressure (DAtri and Ostfeld, 1975; Ray, 1978; Paulus et al, 1975; McCain et al., 1976; Cox et al., 1979).

A review of the inmate self-destructive literature reveals that the personal and legal characteristics of prisoners predict the degree to which they are prone to self-inflicted injury and death. Inmates most susceptible to such self- inflicted injuries and death are first time youthful offenders incarcerated for alcohol related offenses (Danto, 1971; Rieger, 1971; Fawcett and Mars, 1973; Heilig, 1973; Esparza, 1973; Toch, 1975; 1978; Johnson, 1976; Andrews, 1982).

Yet, investigations of inmate self destruction have not clearly demonstrated the extent to which overpopulation mitigates or encourages high levels of in- mate suicide. The isolated studies reported in the correctional literature have been conducted within the surroundings of single prisons or correctional sys- tems, and thus have limited implications for broader conceptions of inmate behavior across organizational settings (McCain et al., 1980).

The contemporary literature on inmate homicides is somewhat less than decisive and has rendered inconsistent conclusions on the effects of over- crowding. Sylvester et al. (1977) examined this relationship for one hundred and thirty prisons housing at least two hundred inmates and concluded that crowding did not systematically relate to increased fatalities.

McCain et al. (1980) compared violent inmate deaths between 1968 and 1977 for prisons under the Texas Department of Corrections, and reported that, although mortality rates were forty percent higher in high population years, the differences were statistically insignificant.

In conclusion, the reIationship between prison overcrowding and suicides or inmate inflicted fatalities is, to some extent, inconsistent with the predic- tions of ethological theorists.

Procedures Prison overcrowding is a notion which cannot be easily understood at the

individual inmate level of analysis, but instead may be thought of as an at- tribute of state prisons or penal reporting areas.

Past issues of the Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics were examined for measures of inmate overcrowding and fatalities. In contrast to these past issues, the most recent Sourcebook (Flanagan et al., 1982) has presented the total number of inmates in each state correctional system, and the number of homicides and suicides reported for these reporting districts.

The same issue has also presented the percentage of one man cells, multiple cells, and prison dormitories which are overcrowded in each reporting area, thus supplying crude indicators of overcrowding in each correctional system.

Findings and Discussion Conventional tests of statistical significance estimate the probability of

falsely rejecting a hypothesis of no relationship between variables from a uni- verse of observations. These tests determine the probability of error in for-

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OVERCROWDING AND INMATE FATALITIES 95

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96 RICHARD ANSON

mulating inferences to hypothetical population parameters. In a sense, the in- dicators reported here represent the universe of all prison systems in the United States during the reporting period. The statistical coefficients which follow, therefore, may be likened to population parameters. The same data, however, may be examined as a sample of time from a mere transcendental universe of temporal phenomena. Moreover, the indicators of overcrowding and inmate fatalities reported here come from a broader domain of item content. For these reasons, then, the results of statistical tests of significance will be reported.

An examination of table 1 reveals the simple correlations between in- dicators of state prison overcrowding and the number and adjusted rates of in- mate fatalities. The most striking finding appearing in the table is the magni- tude of relationship between the number of suicides and homicides reported for each reporting district (r = .54; r2 = .29; p = .05). Approximately thirty per- cent of inmate homicides reported by the states and the District of Columbia may be explained by the number of suicides reported in the same correctional jurisdiction. This single finding clearly suggests that inmate violence is a broad, and somewhat monolithic phenomenon, which is undifferentiated by the specific forms which aggression may take. Outbursts of fatalities inflicted at the hands of other inmates in large part enables prison administrators to an- ticipate high numbers of self-inflicted fatalities within the domain of their cor- rectional activity.

The relationship between correctional overcrowding and fatalities reported to prison authorities is ambiguous and to some extent inconsistent with predictions deduced from ethological theories of aggression. The relation- ship between suicide or homicide and overcrowding depends in large part on the ways that homicide and suicide are translated into quantifiable estimates of inmate violence.

The negative relationship between the percentage of prison dormitories overcrowded (r = - .la; N. S.) and the percentage of suicides occurring in each system tentatively suggests that rates of overcrowding in large, open, con- gregate areas exhibits some deterrent effect on rates of self-inflicted fatalities. The sign of this correlation can be explained in part by the frequency and dura- tion of interpersonal interaction within congested dormitory areas. These crowded prison areas may provide a buffer to the loneliness and deprivation ex- perienced by inmates confined in one or two man cells. Moreover, the research literature has established that hanging is the most common method of suicide (Rieger, 1971; Danto, 1976) and that it occurs most frequently during the early period of incarceration. It follows, that the probability of successful self-stran- gulation in crowded open dormitory areas is significantly reduced because of the greater possibility of intervention by other inmate residents. Finally, the direction of this relationship may be explained by the fact that inmates in dor- mitory areas generally constitute lower security risks than inmates in single or multiple cells. Thus, the negative relationships between rates of suicide and the percentage of overcrowded dormitories may be symptomatic of a more complex relationship among overcrowding, inmate security status, and rates of self-inflicted fatalities,

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OVERCRO WDING AND INMATE FATALITIES 97

When self-inflcted fatalities are scored as the sheer number reported within each Department of Corrections, positive but insignificant relationships emerge between the number of reported suicides and the percentages of multi- ple cells (r = .20; N.S.) and dormitories overcrowded (r = .17, N.S.). These relationships presented in table 1, provide supporting evidence for an ethologi- cal interpretation of inmate behavior.

Finally, an examination of the data presented in table 1 reveals similar pat- terns of relationship between overcrowding and the number and rates of in- mate homicides. As overcrowding increases, the number of homicides increase but this relationship reverses direction once homicidal behavior is computed as a percentage of the entire state prison population.

The data presented here seems to suggest that overcrowding indeed, creates pressures toward aggressive inmate behavior in state prison systems. The num- ber of suicides and homicides increase as the population swells in multiple cells and open dormitory areas. Changes in violent behavior as a proportion of the entire state correctional population, however, reverses direction. This reversal represents convincing empirical evidence that although overpopulation influences instances of inmate aggression, in predictable ways, these instances become confined to a comparatively small segment of the inmate population. Therefore, there are numerical limits to the effects of overpopulation on in- mate violence.

The implication of this finding for the general violence literature is straightforward. An examination of the comparatively small number of sui- cides and homicides occurring in state prisons may be implemented by an anal- ysis of the social, legalistic, and background variables which differentiate vio- lent offenders from their more docile counterparts. These studies in turn should contribute to a reanalysis of inmate violence once the research has translated these individual characteristics into macrostudies of secondary data. In this way, clearly defined system predictors of inmate violence may be uncovered and introduced into formulations of correctional policy.

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Andrews, L. B. 1982. Jailhouse suicides are neither remorseful nor depressed. Psychol- ogy Today (August): 12-13.

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