Professional and peer support preferences for women who self-harm in custody

Published date05 August 2019
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/JCP-12-2018-0049
Date05 August 2019
Pages109-121
AuthorLouise Griffiths,Di Bailey,Karen Slade
Subject MatterHealth & social care
Professional and peer support
preferences for women who self-harm
in custody
Louise Griffiths, Di Bailey and Karen Slade
Abstract
Purpose Peer and professional support are important for women in prison to help them tackle a range of
issues including self-harm. To date, research has not explored in any depth how women experience peer
support provided in prison to help them manage their self-harm including peer support provided through the
Listeners Scheme. The paper aims to discuss these issues.
Design/methodology/approach This was a case study in one womens prison employing mixed,
qualitative methods. These included a questionnaire distributed to women and staff, a focus group with
prison listeners, semi-structured interviews with women who self-harmed and semi-structured interviews
with prison staff, together with a series of observations in the prison site.
Findings While women in prison welcomed both professional and peer support their support preferences
were influenced by how serious women considered their self-harm to be and the degree to which they
regarded their relationships with staff as trusting and/or supportive. The therapeutic community (TC) that
operated in the prison facilitated different relationships between women who self-harmed in prison and staff,
than have hitherto been reported in the research literature. These relationships described by women and staff
as more openallowed women to seek staff support when managing their self-harm behaviours. Women
sought peer support from listeners in addition to staff support particularly at times when staff were unavailable
for example at evenings and weekends.
Research limitations/implications The case study design was conducted in one womens prison which
operated a TC. The principles of the TC that operated in the prison are supported by the wider literature on
TCs as conducive to good mental health. Findings are thus relevant for establishments with TCs .
Originality/value Women opted for support from staff for helping them to manage their severe self-harm,
over and above the peer support available through the prison Listener Scheme. This finding contrasts with
previous research that suggests women trying to manage their self-harm in prison prioritise support from their
peers because staff are often found to harbour unhelpful attitudes to womens self-harm that makes seeking
support difficult.
Keywords Communities, Self-harm, Therapeutic community, Prison staff, Prison listeners,
Women prisoners, Prison peer support
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
The 3,797 women in prison in the UK are in the minority compared to their 78,675 male
counterparts (Official Statistics, 2019). However, womens self-harm in prison remains a concern
for the authorities because women in prison engage in approximately four times more incidents
of self-harm than men and current rates of self-harm in women in prison have increased by
24 per cent from the previous year (Ministry of Justice, 2018). Self-harm can be defined in
different ways, although within prison and health services in the UK, it is generally defined as any
act of self-poisoning or self-injury carried out by an individual irrespective of motivation(NICE,
2011, p. 4).Challenges remain regarding how to provide support and interventions to manage
this behaviour in a current prison climate of reduced resources, which is reflected in the lower
Received 17 December 2018
Revised 29 March 2019
8 May 2019
Accepted 9 May 2019
Louise Griffiths and Di Bailey
are both based at the
Department of Social Work and
Health, Nottingham Trent
University, Nottingham, UK.
Karen Slade is based at the
Department of Psychology,
Nottingham Trent University,
Nottingham, UK.
DOI 10.1108/JCP-12-2018-0049 VOL. 9 NO. 3 2019, pp. 109-121, © Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 2009-3829
j
JOURNAL OF CRIMINAL PSYCHOLOGY
j
PAG E 10 9

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