Comment: In prison, trauma is a constant shadow. Forty-eight percent of men and 44 percent of women in prison in Aotearoa New Zealand have experienced childhood trauma—deeply painful experiences of physical, emotional, or sexual abuse, or physical or emotional neglect.
As you can imagine, trauma can have life-long effects. It can also affect whether people complete prison-based rehabilitation programmes.
One of the main rehabilitation programmes in prisons is provided in special treatment units (STUs). Men in these units spend nine hours a week in group therapy to address the reasons behind their offending. The rest of their time is spent learning life skills such as budgeting and cooking.
People who complete the programme are less likely to commit more offences. However, there’s a major problem: one in three men who enter these units do not complete the programme. So what can we do to increase completion rates and reduce reoffending?
The answer might be looking more closely at childhood trauma. Research has found 82 percent of men in STUs have experienced childhood trauma. Worryingly, the same research found the more childhood trauma an individual had experienced, the less likely they were to complete the programme.
Childhood trauma is a tricky thing to measure and it’s an uncomfortable subject to talk about. Currently, a screening questionnaire (the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire) is used to ask men in special treatment units whether they have experienced various forms of trauma. The men tick one of five response options from “never true” to “very often true”.
Although this questionnaire is commonly used in clinical and community settings, no research has explored whether it is fit for purpose in a prison context. This is what we’re investigating. As part of our research, we’ve spoken to 10 men in such units to understand what it’s like to be asked about childhood trauma via the questionnaire.
Our key finding was that relying on the questionnaire alone is likely to result in under-reporting of childhood trauma and missed opportunities to identify men who are most at risk of dropping out of rehabilitation programmes.
The men we spoke to described the process of completing the questionnaire as overwhelming. For some, having to revisit their childhood experiences triggered intense emotions and even flashbacks, making it feel like they were reliving their trauma.
Some of the men chose not to share their experiences as they worried about being judged or further victimised. One man said:
“We’re embarrassed and ashamed of what’s happened to us … I built myself up to be this person [who] was leading this gang, and I didn’t want that information to get out to my peers because then I become a victim again and I go right back to being that little kid [who’s] gonna get targeted and that’s a huge fear.”
Another challenge arose from the questionnaire itself. The men explained that ticking boxes on the questionnaire didn’t allow them to explain the complex nature of their experiences. For example, they didn’t feel there was space to explain how one parent was abusive while the other might not have been.
After completing the questionnaire and sharing deeply personal information, some felt they were left high and dry. One commented:
“How do you say that from y’know day one you were abused to the day that I was signed off from state care at 18? […] to just tick it off in a box was cold, it was damaging, it’s kind of like ‘you’re not our problem anymore’.”
Despite these negative experiences, the men said talking about childhood trauma was necessary to begin to heal. One said:
“You’ve got to just do it. Ya don’t, ya gonna stay the same and that’s the hard part—if ya don’t let people know.”
How can we ask about trauma in a way that supports healing rather than causing further harm?
Most of the men wanted to talk with someone about their childhood experiences instead of filling in a questionnaire. This conversational approach would give them the space to share their stories in a way that better reflected their experiences, including the positive things that happened in their childhood:
“We don’t want to just highlight everything that was bad in our upbringing […] there were things that may not have been perfect, but we were still nurtured and still loved.”
The men explained they would feel more comfortable talking to someone who had experienced childhood trauma and life in prison. One commented:
“I feel safe enough to share with this guy because he knows what it’s like. He knows the fears that I hold.”
The men also expressed the need for follow-up support. They wanted to know who they could talk to for emotional support and wanted help to work through any negative emotions the questionnaire brought up.
We want to use this research to change the way we ask men in prisons about childhood trauma. By doing this, we may be able to better understand who is at risk of leaving treatment early and provide support through therapy that’s focused on healing trauma. This would not only make rehabilitation programmes more effective but also offer these men a real chance at healing.
This article was originally published on Newsroom. It was written for a psychology communications competition run by the University’s Te Kura Mātai Hinengaro—School of Psychology and supported by the New Zealand Psychological Society.
Jaz Fuller is a Master of Science student at Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington.