Corrections officers’ working relationships in prison and their effect on officers’ perceived safety

A New Vision for Correctional Officers

Amid rising rates of prison violence, corrective service agencies worldwide are increasingly championing body-worn cameras as a tool with the potential of making the prison environment safer. Little is known, however, whether this technology makes correctional officers feel safer while carrying out their duties in an environment with higher rates of violence than most other occupations. Using survey data and interviews with correctional officers in Queensland, Australia, this study shows that for many correctional officers, body-worn cameras do not improve feelings of safety or have a civilizing effect on prisoner behavior. Most correctional officers do believe, however, that the presence of body-worn cameras reduces the threat of false allegations and thereby improves their “professional” safety. This study also considers whether officers’ perceptions of physical or professional safety vary by officer characteristics, body-worn camera usage, and prison type.

As women have increasingly become employed as correctional officers in prisons for male offenders, questions have been raised as to how they may, or may not, differ from their male counterparts. To examine this issue questionnaires were sent to all 866 correctional officers who directly supervised male offenders in five prisons operated by the Correctional Service of Canada. Responses were obtained from 339 officers (39%), 86% of which were male and the remaining 14% female. Female officers were more likely to be unmarried, better educated, less interested in the custody aspect of the correctional officer role, younger, have less experience as a correctional officer, have higher levels of job satisfaction, and be more accepting of women as correctional officers than were their male colleagues. No gender related differences were found in the variables of race, rank, security level worked, stress level, and quality of the working relationship experienced with coworkers. Implications of the findings are discussed

A substantial body of prior research has demonstrated the significant positive effect of organizational procedural justice on institutional policy compliance. However, research examining the antecedents of organizational procedural justice is only just beginning to emerge in the criminal justice literature. Due to the potential for institutional deviance and the importance of rule adherence among individuals in positions of authority, we believe it is important to investigate correctional officers’ procedural justice perceptions. As such, this study examines 929 correctional officers over 40 institutions to identify if criteria for fairness, leadership style, and officer and institutional characteristics influence officers’ perceptions of procedural justice. Results from hierarchical linear regression indicate that the ability to have a say in decisions, a sense that institutional rules are impartial, and perceptions that management leads through motivation and encouragement significantly increases correctional officers’ perceptions of procedural justice. Implications and directions for future research are discussed.

IntroductionIt is critical to provide not only mental health services but also welfare services that meet the socioeconomic needs of people suffering from mental illnesses in order for them to recover. Case managers in the public sector who provide socioeconomic support to the low-income class, in particular, play critical roles in early detection of untreated mentally ill people, linking them to the mental health system, and providing various supports for their community integration. Positive working relationships are required to fulfill these roles.ObjectivesThis study aims to analyze the effects of human rights sensitivity of case managers on the working relationships with the persons with mental illness mediated by empathy.MethodsWe evaluated overall human rights sensitivity, level of empathy(cognitive, affective, behavioral aspects) and working relationships with the mentally ill of 291 public sector case managers(Mean age = 40.52, SD=7.96, female 78.2%, male 21.8%).ResultsIn research model analysis, the goodness-of-fit was evaluated to verify the effect of overall human rights sensitivity on the working relationships with the persons with mental illness mediated by empathy. Most of indices showed sufficient goodness-of-fit. In other words, the higher overall human rights sensitivity is, the higher the level of empathy is, and this has a positive effect on the working relationships with persons with mental illness.ConclusionsTo form positive working relationships with people suffering from mental illnesses, public sector case managers must be educated to increase their empathy by improving their overall human rights sensitivity.DisclosureNo significant relationships.

This study explores trust and positive working relationships among teachers in communities of practice as an avenue for professional development in high schools in South Africa. A mixed methods research approach was employed for this study with the use of a semi-structured interview and semi-structured questionnaires as data collection instruments. Ten schools were purposively selected for this study and seventy-nine participants were selected as samples. The findings of the study show that teachers had good working relationships with their colleagues. The good working relationships they had enabled them to assist their colleagues, share their classroom challenges with them, confide in their colleagues, and they were able to get assistance from them. It was established from the study that a great number of teachers feel safe to be part of the communities of practice activities in the sampled high schools, thus, they engage in diverse of discussions with their colleagues and they were able to relate to their colleagues the difficulties they have in terms of their work. The study recommends that teachers should spend an adequate time in their meetings, see themselves as colleagues, interact as teams, and build strong ties to have good relationships and a strong level of trust among themselves.

This study examines the links between leaders' social skills, organisational health (decline) and positive work relationships. In particular it tests whether leaders' social skills are more strongly associated to work relationships when the organisation's fiscal health is more precarious. Using data from both surveys and annual financial statements of 103 public sector organisations, the results indicate that a leader's social skills and organisational fiscal health are positively related to work relationships. However, the interactive effect of leaders' social skills and organisational fiscal health on positive work relationships was not significant.

In the current study, we explored the prison design and infrastructural changes that Canadian correctional officers consider to be essential in the construction of a new provincial correctional institution intended to replace Her Majesty's Penitentiary (HMP) in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Analyzing 28 semi‐structured interviews conducted with correctional officers employed at HMP, we found the poor working conditions within HMP are, at least in part, related to the physical design of the prison, including inadequate lighting, poor air quality and temperature, high sound levels, and other spatial limitations. Building on the prison design literature, findings suggest that while prison design requires attention to physical security at the forefront, there are ways to improve the space, recognizing how an uncomfortable workplace and living conditions also pose a potential threat to the well‐being and safety of correctional officers and people who are incarcerated.

Early evaluation results of a collaborative partnership.

Working relationships between paraeducators and professionals in education settings have the potential to positively impact classroom environments and students' work toward Individualized Education Plan goals (Adamek & Darrow, 2005; Hughes, Rice, DeBedout, & Hightower, 2002). An important part of working relationships may be understanding the perspectives of those with whom one works. Doing so may enable co-workers to clarify and negotiate expectations of one another. Such role clarification may, in-turn, foster positive working relationships (Giangreco, Suter, & Doyle, 2010). The present authors, placing great value on the working relationships between paraeducators and music therapists in education settings, wondered how paraeducators perceived, and what they might gain from, assisting in music therapy sessions. To this end, we asked paraeducators to participate in focusgroup interviews and describe what they brought to, learned about students in, and gained personally from music therapy sessions.Current literature related to working relationships between paraeducators and professionals typically addresses paraeducators' roles and responsibilities in the workplace. General and special education researchers have investigated this topic in several different ways. They have studied the issue from the perspectives of teachers (French, 1 998) and the paraeducators themselves (Downing, Ryndak, & Clark, 2000). They have examined the specific activities in which paraeducators engage (Griffen-Shirley & Matlock, 2004) and their interactions with other staff and with families (Chopra et al., 2004). They have also examined the dilemmas paraeducators find themselves in when practicing inclusion (Marks, Schrader, & Levine, 1999).Other literature related to working relationships between paraeducators and professionals addresses ways in which professionals might approach their working relationships with paraeducators. In the area of general education, Giangreco (2003) and Riggs (2004) outlined ways in which teachers might enhance working relationships with paraeducators when practicing inclusion. In the area of music education, Bernsdorf (2001) and McCord and Watts (2006) discussed ways to include paraeducators in music classrooms. In the area of music therapy, Adamek and Darrow (2005) and Hughes et al. (2002) discussed ways to interact with paraeducators. All but one of these authors wrote from their own perspectives as general educators, music therapists, music educators and academicians; only Riggs studied paraeducators' perceptions themselves. As a result, there continues to be a lack of literature addressing paraeducators' perspectives on their working relationships with music professionals.The main purpose of this study was to describe paraeducators' perceptions of music therapy sessions because understanding the perspectives of those with whom one works may enable co-workers to clarify and negotiate expectations of one another. As a partial report of the findings of this study, this article describes twenty paraeducators, perceptions of (a) their learning about students through students' engagement in music therapy sessions, (b) their personal gains from music therapy sessions, and (c) collaborative moments in music therapy sessions.MethodBackground and SettingThe present authors, the first a music therapy academician and the second a music therapy clinician, collaboratively developed this study. The academician had no prior relationship with the study participants; the clinician had working relationships of varying years with the study participants (see Participants). During the study's implementation, the clinician served as our liaison to the site's administration and the study participants. The academician collected and analyzed data. The Duquesne University Institutional Review Board approved this study.The study was completed in a small, suburban, special education center that served students with varying disabilities from school districts in the immediate and surrounding counties. …

This study explores the working relationship between store detectives and public law enforcement officers. Thirty semi-structured interviews were conducted with store detectives from two national retail chains. The results of this study indicate that store detectives have a positive working relationship with police and engage in active cooperation with them. In addition, the presence of community development units and organized retail crime task forces enhance active cooperation between the two parties. Findings from this study can be used by both academics and practitioners to promote strong relationships between law enforcement and the retail security industry.

DONs Build Teams Even in Challenging Times

Happiness at work is a central issue that needs to be investigated within the scope of work psychology, especially as a means for building positive characteristics of female correctional officers both individually, family and institutions. the subjects involved were 170 female correctional officers in Cipinang Class I, Narcotics Prison, Pondok Bambu Class IIA, and Salemba Class IIA. The main method to be used in this study was to use a quantitative approach. In this study the researchers conducted several objectives, including: 1.) Testing psychometric properties of work happiness measurement tools on the Oxford Happiness Questionnaire and Work Happiness Scale, 2.) Identifying factors that predict Work Happiness in Women's Correctional Officers, and 3.) Test the differences in work happiness in terms of work units. The results of the multiple linear regression analysis using the stepwise model show that the psychosocial climate safety and work engagement variables contribute 33.7% to work happiness, with a value of R = 0.581, F = 40,445, p <0,001. Furthermore, the model shows that the score of work engagement in predicting work happiness is 0.710 and the score of psychosocial safety climate in predicting work happiness is 0.274. Keywords: Happiness at Work, Correctional Officer, Female

Underlining micro socio-psychological mechanisms of buyer-supplier relationships: Implications for inter-organizational learning agility

Positive work relationships are an important condition for individual well-being and engagement in organizations. They are a central conduit for the improvement of lives, in and out of organizations. This symposium examines the conditions that enable positive work relationships to develop and thrive in organizations. Each paper in this symposium will examine a specific psychological process and present findings from empirical research. The first paper, by Ryan Gottfredson and colleagues, examines the role of mindsets and attributions in the development of trust and positive leader-follower relationships. The second paper, by Sharon Hong and Jeffrey Yip, assess the role of self-disclosure in leader-follower relationships, as well the impact of the leader’s gender on how self-disclosure is received by followers. The third paper by Kathryn Doiron, Christina Putrov, Sharon Hong, and Somi Aggarwal examines the psychological processes of appreciation in work relationships. The final paper, by Jelena Zikic and Kyle Ehrhardt examines the role of uncertainty reduction in building high quality mentoring relationships. The symposium will conclude with remarks from Wendy Murphy who will comment across all four papers and discuss the practical implications of this research for organizations. The Importance of Leader Mindsets in Leader-Follower Relationships Presenter: Ryan Gottfredson; California State U., Fullerton Presenter: Lisa Schurer Lambert; Oklahoma State U. Presenter: Mark Hiatt; Kennesaw State U. Presenter: Anna Maria Zabinski; Oklahoma State U. Self-Disclosure in Leader Follower Relationships Presenter: Sharon Hong; Claremont Graduate U. Presenter: Jeffrey Yip; Claremont Graduate U. Appreciation at Work: An Exploratory Study Presenter: Kathryn Doiron; Claremont Graduate U. Presenter: Christina Putrov; Claremont Graduate U. Presenter: Sharon Hong; Claremont Graduate U. Presenter: Saumya Aggarwal; Claremont Graduate U. Uncertainty Reduction in Mentoring Relationships Presenter: Jelena Zikic; York U. Presenter: Kyle Ehrhardt; U. of Colorado, Denver