Relationship Processes and Resilience in Children with Incarcerated Parents

Children with incarcerated parents are at risk for a variety of problematic outcomes, yet research has rarely examined protective factors or resilience processes that might mitigate such risk in this population. In this volume, we present findings from fi ve new studies that focus on child- or family-level resilience processes in children with parents currently or recently incarcerated in jail or prison. In the fi rst study, empathic responding is examined as a protective factor against aggressive peer relations for 210 elementary school age children of incarcerated parents. The second study further examines socially aggressive behaviors with peers, with a focus on teasing and bullying, in a sample of 61 children of incarcerated mothers. Emotion regulation is examined as a possible protective factor. The third study contrasts children’s placement with maternal grandmothers versus other caregivers in a sample of 138 mothers incarcerated in a medium security state prison. The relation between a history of positive attachments between mothers and grandmothers and the current cocaregiving alliance are of particular interest. The fourth study examines coparenting communication in depth on the basis of observations of 13 families with young children whose mothers were recently released from jail. Finally, in the fi fth study, the proximal impacts of a parent management training intervention on individual functioning and family relationships are investigated in a diverse sample of 359 imprisoned mothers and fathers. Taken together, these studies further our understanding of resilience processes in children of incarcerated parents and their families and set the groundwork for further research on child development and family resilience within the context of parental involvement in the criminal justice system.

Julie Poehlmann, Ph.D., is Professor and Chair of the Human Development and Family Studies department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison; aninvestigator at the Waisman Center, an affiliate of the Institute for Research on Poverty; and a licensed psychologist. She is also the Director of the Centerfor Child and Family Well-Being at the University of Wisconsin. Through numerous publications and outreach efforts, she has brought the attention ofthe child development and family studies communities to the issue of parental incarceration. Her research with children of incarcerated parents has beenfunded by the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Health and Human Services. She also serves as an advisor to Sesame Street as part oftheir resilience initiative.

J. Mark Eddy, Ph.D., is the Director of Research at Partners for Our Children in the School of Social Work at the University of Washington, and a licensed psychologist. His work focuses on the development and testing of researchbased interventions designed to prevent child abuse and neglect and childhood antisocial behavior and related problem behaviors. He has served as principal investigator on several longitudinal randomized controlled trials of interventions within various systems of care, including adult corrections, juvenile justice, child welfare, and primary school.