A study team interviewed 21 Australian participants in depth in 2021 and 2022 regarding the obstacles to correctional visitation and their own visiting experiences as published in Psychiatry, Psychology and Law.
Due to the high recidivism rates among Australian inmates, the researchers set out to look into this. It has been demonstrated that visits can aid with this.
Within two years, 42.7% of Australian inmates will be back behind bars. It has been discovered that visiting convicts lowers their chance of reoffending by 26%. Even still, the majority of prisoners never receive visitors.
Having guests while incarcerated provides additional advantages. It aids inmates’ acclimatization to prison life, to start with. Additionally, it lessens misbehavior, mental health issues, suicidal thoughts, and violence in prison.
The authors of the study discovered that visitor policies and practices can vary both within and between jurisdictions. They may also vary between public and private prisons, as well as between low, medium, and maximum security facilities.
In addition, during their term, inmates move between prisons an average of three times. As such, each time they transfer, visitors might have to pick up new restrictions.
Since they were unfamiliar with the visitation procedure, the majority of participants reported feeling disoriented, emotionally worn out, powerless, and alone, as well as yearning for any information.
