NSF Award Abstract - #0004336| NSF Award Abstract - #0004336 |
AWSFL008-DS3 |
| NSF Org | SES |
| Latest Amendment Date | May 15, 2001 |
| Award Number | 0004336 |
| Award Instrument | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager |
Patricia White SES DIVN OF SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC SCIENCES SBE DIRECT FOR SOCIAL, BEHAV & ECONOMIC SCIE |
| Start Date | July 1, 2001 |
| Expires | June 30, 2004 (Estimated) |
| Expected Total Amount | $340012 (Estimated) |
| Investigator |
Bruce P. Western Western@lydgate.Princeton.edu (Principal Investigator current) Sara M. McLanahan (Co-Principal Investigator current) |
| Sponsor |
Princeton University 4 New South Bldg. Princeton, NJ 085440036 609/258-3090 |
| NSF Program | 1331 SOCIOLOGY |
| Field Application | 0116000 Human Subjects |
| Program Reference Code | 0000,OTHR, |
SES-0004336 WesternThis study examines the impact of incarceration on the family relationships of disadvantaged parents. Although the penal population now totals around 1.9 million inmates and an estimated 1.5 million children have a parent currently in custody, no national survey data are available to study the effects of incarceration on families and children. Under the auspices of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, the investigators will complete a new data collection to examine the effects of incarceration. The Fragile Families survey is a national panel study of new parents that collects rich data on patterns of family formation, child wellbeing, and parental resources. The first follow-up survey - in the field in most sites until summer 2001 - includes a criminal justice module that obtains a detailed incarceration history from male and female respondents. Funds will support an update of this information in the third and fourth waves of the survey. In addition, the investigators will administer special modules for employment history, reasoning ability, and impulsivity. These modules are intended to measure stable propensities to criminal behavior that will help control for the nonrandom selection of offenders into the penal system. Data will be analyzed to examine the effects of incarceration on men's employment and earnings, and the direct effect of incarceration on family formation. It is hypothesized that incarceration negatively influences men's employment opportunities making ex-inmates unattractive partners for marriage or cohabitation. Regardless of their economic status, the stigma of incarceration signals unreliability, further diminishing the marriage prospects of men with prison records. While the study focuses on the link between incarceration and family formation, the data will be of broad interest to researchers interested in the economic position of criminal offenders, their mental health, involvement in parenting, propensity to violence or abuse and a wide range of other topics.
