Norwegian and Icelandic Correctional Services use the normality principle. No one serves their sentence under stricter circumstances than necessary. Offenders are placed in the lowest possible security regime. Prison should be a restriction of liberty but nothing more; that is, no other rights have been removed by the sentencing court.
Offenders have all the same rights as other people, and life inside resembles life outside as much as possible. Offenders have the right to study and vote. Sentences are kept as
short as possible. On average, they are no more than eight months long, and nearly 90% of sentences are for less than a year. The prison prepares inmates for reintegration by
mimicking the outside world. Retributivism and punitive approaches to criminal behaviour are seen as stumbling blocks in the way of progress.
Animals as therapists
Physicians and psychologists worldwide have recommended companion animals for all sorts of conditions, including blindness, deafness, recuperation from surgery, high blood pressure, chemical addiction, and a range of disorders associated with aging.
Animal-assisted therapy has been used as an effective intervention for the elderly, those who have been physically or sexually abused, and people with chronic mental illness.
Animals are also used in prison settings. Ted Conover found during his time as a correction
officer at Sing Sing, that “even more than people on the outside, inmates appreciate pets”. Johnson and Chernoff’s analysis of poetry written by inmates suggests that “perhaps the scarcity of opportunities to develop relationships with non-inmates and the difficulties inherent in connecting with fellow prisoners are responsible for the striking number of poems about the importance of animals”.
Robert Stroud, the Birdman of Alcatraz, cared for the birds that came flying onto the prison island. Pennsylvania inmate James Paluch (2004) writes about birds that wait for him, greeting him each morning. He defends breaking the facility rule against taking food from the dining hall because “I take it for my babies . . . my bird friends”. “Normally, they just swipe up the bread and fly away, but today they stay on the ground and look up at me as if to say ‘Thanks’”.
Johnson and Chernoff observe that “animals as diverse as pigeons and lizards may respond to the prisoners’ ministrations and seem to reward their care”. The nature of relationships that develop between prison inmates and animals has not been researched in-depth, to our knowledge, but their therapeutic value has been recognised in many studies.
Most of the research regarding animals as therapy has been conducted with populations other than offenders. Most developed seems to be the literature regarding the beneficial effects of animals on the elderly; and around chronic and terminal illnesses. Pets have successfully been introduced into psychiatric populations for whom “there is so much loneliness and rejection in an institution that pets can have a real impact”.
At the York Retreat in England, established in 1792 by a Quaker group,175 farm animals were used to teach the psychiatric patients self-control. In 1867, epileptics hospitalised in Bethel, Germany, were treated with animal therapy. This centre uses pet therapy treatments to this day. In the United States in the early 1940s, at the Army Air Corps Convalescent Hospital in Pawling, New York, men recovering from service-related injuries worked
with farm animals as part of a regimen of non-stressful activities.
Clinical research at the University of Maryland that ran from 1977 to 1979 and studied the effects of animals on patients with coronary heart disease found that divorced, single, and widowed men and women died from heart disease at higher rates than those who were married. The scientists examined variables such as neighbourhood, social encounters, the birthplace of parents, life changes, and measures of mood. It was pet ownership that best
predicted who lived or died. After documenting the effects on heart disease, Beck and Katcher conducted an experiment designed to compare pet owners talking to a stranger with those interacting with their pets. They found that participants’ blood pressure was highest when talking to the researcher and lower when at rest, but lowest when the participants were talking to and petting their animals. And “since that first conclusion, that unlike talking to people, talking to animals reduces stress and blood pressure, the validity of the observation has been confirmed by many other investigators” (p. 81).
By recording the interactions, the researchers could watch people’s facial expressions while talking with their animals. Pet owners generally speak to their animals “with softer, higher-pitched voices than normal, their conversation punctuated with simple questions . . . and
with their attention fully on the animal to the exclusion of all else” (p. 82).179
And although in most social interactions, American men are viewed as engaging in touch less often than women, the same cannot be said about how the sexes relate to their pets. The researchers found that “men and women touched their dogs as frequently and for just as long. . . . There were no significant differences between the sexes” (P 89). Even the mere sight of an animal can reduce tension. In a series of experiments, Kutcher and a research partner had children come into a room with either a lone researcher or the researcher accompanied by a friendly dog. The children’s blood pressure was lowest when the dog was present. Fish (present today in medical offices everywhere) were also found to have similar calming effects. The researchers explained their results with a seemingly simple fact: “We relax whenever any neutral visual event draws our attention outward and interrupts
our ongoing train of thought.”
While Beck and Katcher were conducting their first experiments, other researchers were investigating the effects of companion animals in psychiatric treatment. The program at Lima State Hospital for the Criminally Insane (today Oakwood Forensic Center), in Ohio, established in 1975, remained one of the most oft-cited animals-assisted programs and was the first formal program to use a maximum-security population.
The program was started after the unit director was struck by how the usually solitary and unresponsive patients coordinated their efforts to hide and feed an injured wild bird that one of them had come across. After several years, the program was evaluated by comparing
patients on a unit with animals to those on one without animals. Both wards had comparable patients and were of equal levels of security. The patients with pets required “half as much medication, had drastically reduced incidents of violence and had no suicide attempts during the year-long comparison. The ward without pets had eight documented suicide attempts during the same year”.
Changes in psychology often accompany changes in behaviour. Improvements in both conduct and attendance were noticed after a dog made regular visits to a school for
children with severe behavioural handicaps. Arkow (1998) discusses several behavioural studies that further demonstrate the range of potential treatment effects in psychiatric populations. In one experiment, offenders with chronic mental illness were videotaped
answering questions with and without a dog present. Patients spoke more words and responded more quickly when a dog was in the room. In another study, physically
ill, depressed outpatients laughed more readily and maintained a sense of humour after becoming pet owners.
The unconditional positive regard received from an animal can be of particular significance to prison inmates who have been identified as a population vulnerable to “social isolation that leaves people without the social or family support they need during a . . . crisis.” The companionship that develops is also a source of security in an adversarial environment.
With animals, inmates are allowed to interact with a living being with no interest in their past actions or mistakes. Especially for males, who, it has been noted, “have few socially-acceptable outlets for touching and caressing,” the mutual affection that a relationship with an animal provides can be therapeutic.”
For inmates who live lives absent of touch and acceptance, animals can “stimulate a kind of love and caring that is not poisoned or inhibited by the prisoners’ experiences with people”.
The fact that animals have relaxing and reassuring effects on people is reflected in how animals are increasingly used in everyday work.
As airports have become increasingly tension-filled places, the presence of explosive-detecting canines can produce a calming effect, in addition to being more accurate than machines monitored by people. At Los Angeles International Airport, the dogs have been described as cheering people up and providing passengers with a sense of security: “Strolling through a terminal here with Jackson was like being with Julia Roberts on a crowded street. Nearly everyone who noticed her responded with a smile or an outstretched
hand, followed by kissing sounds.” The security officers who are partnered with dogs also report feeling more relaxed when on the job.
Given the beneficial physiological and psychosocial effects, it should be no surprise that animals have been incorporated into prison life. Despite their increased development, there are “abundant anecdotal and qualitative assessments but few controlled, empirically
based studies” of the programs.
In a review of the literature published by Correctional Services of Canada, animal therapy was found in the United States, Canada, England, Scotland, Australia, and South Africa. In addition to using a wide variety of animals, these programs also encompass a range
of program designs as well. Although dogs are the most common, this recent review reports that animals used in PAPs include wild animals, farm animals, and other domestic animals such as cats.
There are several reasons prisons are increasingly implementing therapy animal programs. Primarily, the programs may be established to benefit a facility’s inmates (Lai, 1998). They can also serve as a source of revenue for the prison. An additional benefit comes from the positive community relations fostered (Harkrader, Burke, & Owen, 2004). Inmates are viewed as engaging in positive work and as serving the community. Beyond the correctional
benefits for individual offenders and the overall facility, the animals also contribute to a social issue when, for example, the program rescues unwanted pets that would otherwise
be destroyed (Lai, 1998).
The great demand for working dogs has created a market where the large blocks of time available to prison inmates make them ideal candidates to conduct the intensive and time-consuming training required for animals to go on to specialised service work.
One of the forerunners of therapy animal programs was the Purdy Treatment Center for Women, a maximum-security prison in Washington. It was here that a now standard program design was originated—teaching inmates to train dogs— with the help of a former
inmate.
Image: The Guardian
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