ABSTRACT
This chapter summarizes what is known about the experiences of incarcerated parents. It focuses on the intersection of parenting and criminal justice involvement from the time of arrest and sentencing, during the separation caused by incarceration, to the release and reentry of the parent into the community and back into their children’s lives. When individuals are incarcerated they are imprisoned in a jail, prison, or detention center. Parental incarceration disproportionately impacts African American children and children living in poverty. Several theoretical perspectives provide a useful framework to understand the experience of parental incarceration. Demographic characteristics of incarcerated parents suggest that many may have lived in stressed environments that are not conducive to warm, responsive, and sensitive parenting. Parenting during an incarceration is characterized by separation, visitation and contact in what are often difficult and not family friendly environments, and managing a coparenting with the child’s caregiver.
