Prison Officer Legitimacy, Their Exercise of Power, and Inmate Rule Breaking

• NCJ Number: 254052
• Journal: Criminology Volume: 56 Issue: 4 Dated: 2018 Pages: 750-779
• Author(s): Benjamin Steiner; John Wooldredge
• Date Published: 2018
• Length: 30 pages
• Grant Number(s): 2007-IJ-CX-0010
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Research (Applied/Empirical)
• Award: Maintaining Prison Order: An Evaluation of the Effects of the Detection and Processing of Inmate Misconduct Within and Across Ohio Correctional Institutions

Annotation

Since prison officers are directly responsible for transmitting penal culture and prison policy to the confined, yet few studies of officers of impact on inmate behavior have been conducted, the current study examined the effect of inmates of perceptions of officer legitimacy on rule breaking within prisons, as well as the effects of officers of reliance on different power bases on rates of rule breaking across prisons.

Abstract

The findings from bi-level analyses of data from inmates and officers from 33 prisons revealed that inmates who held stronger views regarding officer legitimacy committed fewer nonviolent infractions, but that perceived legitimacy did not affect the number of violent offenses inmates committed. The study also examined a subsample of inmates encountered by officers for a rule violation and found no relationship between perceived legitimacy and subsequent rule breaking, although stronger perceptions of procedural justice related to the incident did directly and indirectly (through perceived legitimacy) coincide with lower odds of nonviolent misconduct. At the prison level, the study found that prisons in which officers exercised their authority more lawfully and fairly (positional power) or by relying more on their skills and expertise (expert power) had lower rates of violent or nonviolent rule violations. Prisons in which officers relied more on coercion had higher levels of nonviolent infractions. (publisher abstract modified)