Custodial sentencing

• Custodial sentencing

  Involves a convicted offender being punished by serving time in prison or another closed institution such as a young offenders institute or psychiatric hospital
• deterrence

  the unpleasant prison experience is designed to put off the individual and society at large, from engaging in offending behaviour.

  Individual deterrence is based on punishmentent from operant conditioning and general deterrence is based on vicarious punishment from SLT
• Incapacitation

  the offender is taken out of society to prevent them from reoffending in order to protect the public, especially from those who may not be capable of controlling their behaviour 
• Retribution

  society is enacting revenge for the crime b making the offender suffer, and this should be proportionate to the seriousness of the crime. The victim/family then feel a sense of justice being done 
• Rehabilitation

  the offender can be reformed and made into a better person through some form of education or therapy. They should leave prison better adjusted and ready to return to society 
• Psychological effects- 

  • stress and depression
  • Institutionalisation- leads to a lack of autonomy, conformity to roles and a dependent culture
  • brutalisation- prison acts as a school for crime
  • Overcrowding and lack of privacy 
  • Deindividualisation
  • Effects on family
  • Labelling- loss of social contacts and reduced employability, all affecting recidivism rates
• A strength of custodial sentencing is it provides opportunity for training and treatment

  offenders may become better people during their time in prison, and their improved character means they may be able to lead a crime-free life when back in society.

  Can access education and training whilst in prison increasing the possibility they will find employment upon release.

  This suggests prison may be a worthwhile experience assuming offenders are able to access these programmes.
• A limitation is they may learn to become better offenders

  they may undergo a more dubious education as part of their sentence.

  Time spent with long-term offenders may give younger inmates in particular the opportunity to learn the tricks of the trade.

  This form of education may undermine attempts to rehabilitate prisoners and consequently may make reoffending more likely.
• One limitation is it has negative psychological effects on prisoners 

  for many offenders, imprisormnent can be brutal, demeaning and generally devastating.

  119 people killed themselves in prisons, an increase of 32% on the previous year. an average suicide of one every three days, 9 times higher than in the general population.

  This supports the view that oppressive prison regimes may be detrimental to psychological health which could impact on rehabilitation.