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Incarcerated women report high rates of sexual victimization. Interviews with 63 previously incarcerated women survivors of sexual violence explored perceptions toward receiving trauma-focused therapy while incarcerated and postrelease trauma-focused therapy utilization. Nearly all participants (97%) recommended that trauma-focused therapy be available to incarcerated women. Most believed that prisons are acceptable places to receive trauma-focused therapy, without qualification (65%); some reported mixed feelings or indicated acceptability but identified factors that would increase acceptability (33%). Notably, most were currently experiencing trauma-related symptoms, but few had attended trauma-focused therapy following release. Findings indicate that access to prison-based trauma-focused therapy is necessary and acceptable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Incarcerated perinatal populations report high rates of substance use in the United States (US). Despite this, substance use disorder (SUD) treatment is not routinely available in carceral settings and state policies related to the provision of substance use screening and treatment are unknown. Methods: We conducted a systematic search in WestLaw through the end of the 2020 legislative session combining the terms "pregnant" and "postpartum" with terms for incarceration and related terms. The search returned 453 statutes from 43 states. A deductive codebook of various maternal health topics was developed. Legislative texts related to SUD screening and treatment were extracted for textual analysis. Results: Of the 43 states identified as having at least 1 state statute pertaining to pregnant or postpartum incarcerated people, 7 states had statutes relevant to SUD screening and treatment. Statutes related to substance use screening, education, treatment and diversion programs, program eligibility, aftercare and release planning, and funding appropriations. Conclusions: The majority of states across the U.S. lack legislation that address SUD screening and treatment among incarcerated perinatal populations. Given the known limited access to SUD treatment for perinatal populations in custody, increasing legislative statutes could increase access to essential care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pregnancy is a critical time to provide access to substance use treatment; this is especially true among incarcerated populations, who are known to be at particularly high risk of poor health outcomes. In this integrated literature review, we (1) report what is known about the prevalence of substance use among incarcerated pregnant and postpartum populations; (2) describe substance use treatment programs and current care practices of pregnant and postpartum populations in carceral settings; and (3) explore recommendations and strategies for increasing access to substance use treatment for incarcerated pregnant and postpartum populations. A comprehensive search of seven electronic databases yielded in the retrieval of 139 articles that were assessed for inclusion. Of the retrieved articles, 33 articles met criteria for inclusion in this review. A review of the literature revealed that the understanding of substance use prevalence among pregnant incarcerated women is limited. We also found that treatment of substance use disorders among pregnant and postpartum populations is not routinely available, enhanced perinatal services are sorely needed, and substance use treatment programs are feasible with the help of community partnerships. More research is required to understand current substance use treatment initiatives and outcomes for pregnant women in prison. In addition, strategies for integrating evidence-based, substance use treatment in carceral settings is also needed. Future directions are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most women who are incarcerated have experienced sexual violence; difficulties adjusting to prison could interfere with women's ability to benefit from trauma-focused therapy. Here, we explored whether therapeutic benefits of trauma treatment varied as a function of time since incarceration. Women (N = 128) participated in an 8-week group treatment for sexual violence victimization while incarcerated in a community corrections center for nonviolent offenses. Ninety participants consented to the study and completed self-report questionnaires assessing internalizing symptoms (depression, posttraumatic stress, and shame) before and after treatment. Bivariate correlations revealed a significant negative association between time since incarceration and pretreatment depression but not posttraumatic symptoms or shame. Dependent-sample t tests revealed significant improvements from pretreatment to posttreatment in internalizing symptoms. Longer time since incarceration did not significantly predict internalizing symptoms after controlling for pretreatment symptom severity. Findings suggest trauma-focused treatments can be offered to women shortly after they are incarcerated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Incarcerated women evidence high rates of both interpersonal trauma and mental illness. In particular, the rates of sexual violence victimization are so high that some researchers have suggested that sexual abuse may be a pathway to prison for women, likely through the development of mental illness, including substance abuse. This review article summarizes the literature on sexual victimization (n = 32 articles; 28 independent studies) and mental illness (n = 11 articles; 8 independent studies) prevalence among samples of incarcerated women (N s ≥ 100) in context of methodological choices within included articles. Best estimates for sexual victimization from studies using established survey methods were as follows: 50–66% for child sexual abuse, 28–68% for adult sexual abuse, and 56–82% for lifetime sexual assault. Although data directly comparing prevalence of sexual victimization among incarcerated women to prevalence for other groups are limited, the existing data indicate that incarcerated women have significantly greater exposure than incarcerated men and community samples of women. Moreover, compared to findings from the National Comorbidity Survey-Replication, incarcerated women evidence greater prevalence of most lifetime and current mental illnesses, especially depressive disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder, and substance use disorders. Surprisingly, only two independent studies have investigated the overlap between sexual victimization and mental illness in samples of incarcerated women. Both studies found disproportionally high rates of mental illness among victims of sexual violence. Suggestions and implications for research, policy, and practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current behavioral tasks assessing distress tolerance measure tolerance to frustration and tolerance to physical discomfort, but do not explicitly assess tolerance to negative emotion. We closely evaluated the conceptual distinctions between current behavioral tasks and self-report tasks assessing distress tolerance, and then developed a new behavioral distress tolerance task called the Emotional Image Tolerance (EIT) task. The EIT task retains elements of existing behavioral tasks (e.g., indices of persistence) while augmenting the reliability and content sufficiency of existing measures by including multiple trials, including a variety of negative affect stimuli, and separating overall task persistence from task persistence after onset of distress. In a series of three studies, we found that the EIT correlated with extant behavioral measures of distress tolerance, the computerized mirror-tracing task and a physical cold pressor task. Across all of the studies, we also evaluated whether the EIT correlated with self-report measures of distress tolerance and measures of psychopathology (e.g., depression, anxiety, and binge eating). Implications for the refinement of the distress tolerance construct are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Facial Action Coding System (Ekman & Friesen) has shown promise as a behavioral measure of emotional experience. The current study examined the degree of (de)synchrony between self-reported and facial expressions of fear, disgust, and sadness in response to a traumatic event–relevant film among individuals who had experienced a traumatic motor vehicle accident. Given high rates of comorbidity between posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) and depressive symptoms, the potential impacts of both PTSS and depressive symptoms on emotional responding were examined. Results demonstrated synchrony between self-reported and facial expressions of disgust and sadness; however, no association between measures of fear was observed. Furthermore, depressive symptoms were associated with greater fear responding and PTSS were associated only with self-reported fear. Together, results support the importance of examining discrete negative emotions, rather than broad valence categories, when examining fear-based responding in traumatic event–exposed populations. Additional research examining the psychometric properties of the Facial Action Coding System as a measure of discrete emotional experiences among traumatic event–exposed individuals is needed to advance multimodal assessment approaches that yield incremental information for understanding emotional responding in this population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent work has extended the idea of implicit self-theories to the realm of emotion to assess beliefs in the malleability of emotions. The current article expanded on prior measurement of emotion beliefs in a scale development project. Items were tested and revised over rounds of data collection with both students and nonstudent adult online participants. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses revealed a three-factor structure. The resulting scale, the Emotion and Regulation Beliefs Scale, assesses beliefs that emotions can hijack self-control, beliefs that emotion regulation is a worthwhile pursuit, and beliefs that emotions can constrain behavior. Preliminary findings suggest that the Emotion and Regulation Beliefs Scale has good internal consistency, is conceptually distinct from measures assessing individuals’ beliefs in their management of emotions and facets of emotional intelligence, and predicts clinically relevant outcomes even after controlling for an existing short measure of beliefs in emotion controllability. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

How visual qualities of a food impact perceptions of the amount of food present and consumed have been studied. Previous research has investigated many factors affecting these perceptions, including the height of a glass, the size of a serving bowl, and other food intake cues. We investigated how the number of pieces a serving is divided into impacts perceptions of the amount of food present and consumed. Results indicate that dividing a fixed portion into a greater number of pieces leads people to perceive a greater amount of food in the serving. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]