The Boston Reentry Study: Analysis and Preparation of Public Use Data

Harvard University, Cambridge MA

Investigators

Abstract

NSF 1627693 Bruce Western Harvard University In an era of historically high US incarceration rates, the transition from prison to the community of released prisoners has had far-reaching effects on the population and poverty dynamics of neighborhoods of concentrated disadvantage. Despite a large body of research studying the effects of incarceration, relatively few studies have analyzed in detail the process of leaving prison and entering a community. In this context, this project extends prior research by offering innovative new analyses of data and the creation of publicly available data files from the Boston Reentry Study (BRS), a longitudinal study of 122 Massachusetts state prisoners newly-released to the Boston area that yielded an unparalleled response rate of 94 percent through 4 waves of follow-up in the year after prison release. The current project will thus provide a unique data set, including rich quantitative and qualitative information for the analysis of community return for a sample of newly-released prisoners under contemporary conditions of mass incarceration. The current project---including new analysis and data dissemination---will greatly expand the scope of the study's influence by informing policy debates on programs for transitional employment after prison, social supports for families that do much of the caring work immediately after incarceration, and for recidivism reduction, identifying key vulnerabilities in the year after prison release. The research will also play an important role in the academic development of students with interests in poverty and incarceration by involving them in the analysis of data and preparation of papers. The current project will broaden understanding of the connection of a highly marginal population to mainstream social institutions, allowing in particular new analyses of family relationships, employment, and recidivism. The project comprises two main parts. First, new data analysis will capitalize on a variety of unique features of the BRS data. Income data are available monthly and include measures of wages, public assistance, support from families and illegal earnings. Data on families and children includes all sources of family support including the parents of released prisoners, and all children, allowing a complete mapping of multiple partner fertility. The analysis of recidivism will combine quantitative criminal record information with qualitative accounts including re-incarceration interviews yielding a new understanding of the social process of returning to custody, particularly for those who are relapsing to addiction or violating the conditions of community supervision. Second, archival work on the BRS will involve the preparation of a public-use data set, restricted-use data files including criminal records and other sensitive data, and qualitative materials including interview transcripts or audio tapes. The dissemination of these data will allow a wide variety of analyses of the process of social integration after incarceration, will promote mixed methods research that combines statistical analysis with the interpretative analysis of recorded and transcribed interviews and will contribute a unique public good to the community of scholars working on the problems of incarceration and poverty.