Architecture and Correctional Services: A Facilities Approach to Treatment

Abstract

Facilities are important aspects of rehabilitative treatment. To fully understand the impact of a facility on the effectiveness of treatment, the direct perspectives of service providers are critical. We examine four autoethnographic accounts from correctional service providers to determine the role of the facility in their provision of care and organize these into considerations of three central aspects of correctional architecture—space, layout, and setting (SLS)—which play an important role in the efficacy of rehabilitative services. We conclude by proposing how research may advance in this area, especially through the use of practitioner accounts.

Keywords

treatment architecture corrections autoethnography prisons jails

Introduction

Mass incarceration in the United States has led to a litany of undesirable effects for people during their incarceration and post-release (St. John, 2019), including economic hardship (Western & Pettit, 2010), psychological maladjustment (Haney, 2003), difficulty in socialization (Rose & Clear, 1998), limited access to education (Evans, Szkola, & St. John), and petrifaction of criminal tendencies (Nagin, Cullen, & Jonson, 2009; Travis, 2005). Especially concentrated in minority communities (Lopez-Aguado, 2016; Sorensen, Hope, & Stemen, 2003), carceral effects are not confined to the offender, but ripple out to other members of society, exponentializing their impact (Dallaire, 2007; Western & Wildeman, 2009). Nevertheless, although many question the efficacy of incarceration, the United States continues to respond to crime, in great part, through imprisonment. Applegate, Suriette, and McCarthy (1999) remind that, should Americans choose to continue the imprisonment of their fellow citizens, the society must consider better ways of housing them and preparing them for eventual release. Johnston (2000) often criticized the lack of architectural design supported by cohesive theory and evidentiary research. We seek to address both Johnston’s and Applegate’s concerns, contributing to the integration of correctional architectural theory and facility design and, going still further, to advocate and demonstrate practice-informed theory. We do this through an examination of an often-overlooked topic—the role of correctional architecture in rehabilitative treatment.

Researchers have acknowledged the incongruence between a professed goal of rehabilitation and the ways in which correctional environments allow for, and perhaps facilitate, counter-rehabilitative behaviors, such as coercion and abuse (de Valk, Kuiper, van der Helm, Maas, & Stams, 2016). In recognizing the limits of rehabilitative efforts in debilitative settings, one cannot divorce counterproductive behaviors, attitudes, and perceptions from the counterproductive physical spaces in which those behaviors, attitudes, and perceptions occur. Spaces influence psychological and emotional states—“the built environment can channel the possibilities of affect” and can be brought to bear to “engineer feeling and emotions” (Adey, 2008, p. 441). Environments that cultivate negative emotions, disruptive attitudes, and antisocial behavior in incarcerated persons engender detrimental impacts, especially on rehabilitative services, impeding the counselor’s ability to provide therapeutic services and the instructor’s ability to teach, and on and on.

Correctional facility design has progressed in recent decades to better address the issues that come from flaws in previous designs. New-generation, or pod-style, designs are exemplars of this improvement, constructed to address safety concerns, encourage relationship-building, and relieve crowding (Applegate & Paoline, 2007). Nonetheless, Williams, Rodeheaver, and Huggins (1999) stress the need for a more cohesive body of literature on effective facility design. In reviewing the literature, there appear to be three key elements to a facility’s support of, or disruption of, treatment—its space, layout, and setting (SLS). These all contribute to the behavioral and psychological outcomes of people in custody and the effectiveness of services meant to improve those metrics.

Sommer (1971) pinpoints space, overcrowding, privacy, and the lack of sensory stimulation specifically as the major architectural components that harm incarcerated individuals, calling for research exploring facility location, size, and layout. He further argues that these elements should not be perceived as optimal conditions of confinement, but rather viewed as the minimum conditions taken under consideration when incarcerating persons. Prior to Sommer, Johnston (1961) cautioned against the building of poorly designed prisons and, instead, argued for the creation of facilities incorporating rehabilitative characteristics. He highlighted a shift in how the United States and Europe were designing correctional facilities, a transformation in thinking about penal architecture that included changes in facility size, locations closer to communities, and improvements in facility aesthetics, all while maintaining security. Building from this body of work, we propose a framework of correctional design focused on spatial characteristics, spatial layout, and sensory stimulation—SLS—and explore this framework empirically through practitioner autoethnography. We conclude by putting forward ways that our proposed framework can be utilized to inform current correctional architecture.

Foundations: Empirical Support for an SLS Framework

A review of the literature reveals significant support for the notion that the architectural space in which service provision occurs is crucial to rehabilitation during incarceration. Architecture may be either a tool for service provision or a distraction from it. In conducting a comprehensive review, three broad classes of architectural features appear to be most salient.

Facility Space

Space is defined as “a limited extent in one, two or three dimensions,” that extent being “set apart,” and determined, in part, by how “objects and events occur and have relative position and direction” (see Space, 2016). This includes “the distance from other people or things that a person needs to remain comfortable.” As a concept, space influences an incarcerated person’s rehabilitation through determinations of capacity and location.

Capacity refers to the maximum number of individuals that can be accommodated without compromising facility performance. Legal standards can inform occupational limitations, though these should not be seen as singularly determinative. Baldursson (2000) and Johnsen, Granheim, and Helgesen (2011) suggest that facilities with lower levels of occupancy are safer environments because they allow officers to more efficiently surveil and to form better relationships with incarceated persons, both of which help in perceiving safety risks quickly and de-escalating disputes earlier and more effectively. Facilities at lower capacity should allow for easier logistics around socially stimulating functions such as recreation or visitations. These conditions lessen fear of harm and increase the ability to maintain social ties, both important aspects of rehabilitation.

Research has linked the health and mental well-being of individual persons in custody with an institution’s capacity for personal space—the three-dimensional extent needed for a person to feel comfortable (Lawrence & Andrews, 2004; Sibley & van Hoven, 2009). Architectural features have biophysical impacts on incarcerated persons: Schaeffer et al. (1998) found that catecholamine, a hormone that can cause hypertension, increased in inmates removed from private cells and placed in more open housing due to their fear of incursions on privacy. He further posits that social and spatial density within inmate sleeping quarters may explain high levels of stress and blood pressure for similar reasons.

Just as a space is defined, in part, by the capacity of its boundaries, it is equally defined by its relationship to other places and things. History has shown the great import of distance on human behavior. Location is best understood as the physical placement of a correctional facility and its proximity to other important objects. Being housed within the confines of a correctional facility creates social distance between the “criminal” and “innocent,” secluding them in a sort of parallel universe (Goffman, 1968). This can be incredibly detrimental to treatment. Harer and Steffensmeier (1996) studied nearly 60 federal prisons and showed that incarcerated people who were able to maintain outside relationships were less likely to engage in prison violence. It was reducing social distance, not increasing it, that precipitated prosocial change. Yet, evermore distant prisons make it difficult for family and friends to travel to correctional facilities to lend the in-person support that stimulates rehabilitation. Although there are technological means for communication between persons inside a facility and intimates at a distance, this does not serve as an adequate replacement of in-person interactions (Digard, diZerega, Yaroni, & Rinaldi, 2016).

Both capacity and location, then, have important impacts on people in custody. Smaller prisons, with lower housing capacities that provide increased personal and private space to inmates and are located closer to their supportive networks, would do much to cultivate an atmosphere conducive to rehabilitation. In combination with counseling, it may be argued that facilities with these characteristics help to mitigate the trauma of the prison experience at worst and, at best, facilitate the penitence and behavioral correction prisons were purportedly built for.

Layout

The layout of a correctional facility refers to the arrangement of its constituent structures within its defined spatial parameters, best visualized through its blueprint. There are a number of typical correctional layouts. For example, in the “telephone pole” layout, a facility has one primary corridor for movement. Perpendicular pathways extend from the corridor, parallel to one another, and lead to cell blocks and other locations within the facility. In radial layouts, wings of linear cell blocks extend from a central point like the spokes of a wheel (Fairweather & McConville, 2000). At the center, there are controls that open and close the access points to each wing. Other layouts include the campus style, which consists of several independent buildings enclosed by a secure perimeter gate or wall, similar to a university campus (Johnston, 2000); the courtyard layout, in which buildings are placed in a square around a central courtyard (Fairweather & McConville, 2000); and the high-rise layout, multilayered facilities constructed upward and resembling skyscrapers (Beijersbergen, Dirkzwager, van der Laan, & Nieuwbeerta, 2016).

Facilities’ layouts play a role in promoting either socialization or isolation (Moran & Jewkes, 2015). Blount-Hill, St. John, & Ryan (2017) have referred to this characteristic as social facility (or social facilitation) and suggest that it may be important in shaping perceptions of fairness among building occupants, including those occupying prisons. Correctional facility layouts may also impact safety in correctional facilities, though what is the optimal design is still in contention. In a study of 1,900 Dutch incarcerated persons, Beijersbergen et al. (2013) found that officer–prisoner relationships were rated as significantly more positive by prisoners in newer, campus-style facilities, though Morris and Worral (2014) studied two correctional facilities in Texas and found that the campus-style layout was correlated to increased rates of property misconduct (e.g., stealing, trafficking, and trading), security infractions, drug infractions, incarcerated person-on-staff violence, and security-related infractions. Nevertheless, the point stands: Facility layout influences social behavior and, therefore, increases or inhibits the rehabilitative impacts of social support. Thus, the physical characteristics of a facility should be constructed to influence perceptions, attitudes, and behavior of occupants in rehabilitative, versus debilitative, ways.

Setting

Setting encapsulates the aesthetics, objects, and characteristics of a facility and their condition, particularly concerning how they engage the five senses. Roughly, setting refers to the facility’s “scenery” (see Setting, 2016). Studies demonstrate how poor conditions can influence building occupants, which may include abrasive sensory inputs, such as elevated noise levels and uncomfortable temperatures, as well as poor biological conditions arising from the lack of cleanliness (Williams et al., 1999). For example, educational services may be impeded when provided in poor settings. Wener and Olsen (1980) demonstrated that decorating units with brighter colors, less barring, more windows, and carpets brought declines in antisocial behaviors, such as vandalism, that represent setbacks in treatment. Attitudinal measures showed improvement as well, with the setting influencing an incarcerated person’s satisfaction and the choice to self-regulate behavior. Institutions furnished with damage-resistant materials show increased attempts at vandalism, perhaps due to communicating the message that people in custody are expected to attempt their destruction (Applegate et al., 1999).

Some lessons learned in other contexts should be transferable to prison. In a study of educational facilities, whether a building was seen as dilapidated or well-maintained, contributed to a difference of 5% to 17% in test scores among students and to lower levels of teacher effectiveness (Earthman, 2002). James, Carswell, and Sweaney (2009) found that resident dissatisfaction with noise levels was associated with the perceived quality of residential space and whether a tenant would recommend it to a friend. In addition, noise levels were found to be associated in cognitive declines among adults in these homes (James & Sweaney, 2009). Dilapidation and poor sensory conditions serve as symbolic messages to incarcerated people, correctional officers, and other occupants, including the public. Wilson and Kelling’s (1982) influential “broken windows” theory held that high levels of physical disorder show miscreants that neighborhoods are uncared for and open for misconduct and further damage. Similar logic has been applied in the context of buildings (Blount-Hill and St. John, 2017).

Methodological Choices: Why Autoethnography?

We chose autoethnography as the method of examining the interplay between architectural features and the delivery of rehabilitative services in prison. Ethnography involves a set of tried-and-true methods to develop a rich, descriptive, and experiential investigation of culture. Autoethnography does exactly this, only focusing investigation on one’s own social role and lived experience as opposed to those of another (Stahike Wall, 2016). Autoethnography is still an emerging methodology; conceptualization of the method is as yet unsettled and a full inventory of appropriate techniques not yet fully determined (Chapman-Clarke, 2016; Denshire and Lee, 2013). This is true in health research, where the method has its strongest presence, and more so in the fields of criminal justice and criminology.

For our purposes, we choose to use analytic autoethnography. Analytic autoethnography (as opposed to freer flowing evocative autoethnography) requires applying traditional methods of qualitative analysis to the examination of one’s own experience (Anderson, 2006; Chang, 2016; Stahike Wall, 2016). In doing so, autoethnographers

contextualize their personal experiences within the sociocultural and historical context, where their own experiences and those of others took place, compare their experiences with others, and examine their experiences against published works illuminating on the sociocultural meanings of their personal experiences. (Chang, 2016, p. 444)

We recognized early on that autoethnography would make this work potentially vulnerable to attack by those who see the method as a less-than-acceptably-rigorous form of research. After all, the essential point of science is to provide “objective truth,” in contrast to other sources of knowledge (e.g., intuition, faith, or conjecture). Numbers are objective; individual experiences are not, and, most especially, not from the point of view of the individual herself or himself. Perceived lack of objectivity is one reason the entire panoply of qualitative methods garners low esteem among a significant many. If qualitative methods in general are a challenge to the hegemony of quantitative analysis in scientific inquiry, a method as seemingly avant-garde as autoethnography is a particular threat to a worldview that supports status quo methods of generating “knowledge.”

What seems to be beyond dispute is that researcher perspectives creep into “objective” science in myriad ways, including researchers’ prerogative to decide what is worthy of study, what qualifies as rigor, through what theoretical lens a set of findings will be viewed, how results should be interpreted, and so on. Autoethnography merely recognizes the fact openly and creates the rare moment where a researcher embraces the influence of their own experience and perspectives instead of seeking to limit or deny them. In many ways, autoethnography is the quintessential qualitative method, taking the “personal connection between the researcher and the field being studied” that has “often”—or always—been present within human subject research and systematically using it to provide insights into little-perceived processes of critical importance to social life (Stahike Wall, 2016, p. 2).

Diamond (1997) reminds that “the word ‘science’ means ‘knowledge’ (from the Latin scire, ‘to know,’ and scientia, ‘knowledge’), to be obtained by whatever methods are most appropriate to the particular field” (p. 421). Ways of gaining knowledge must, therefore, adapt to the type of knowledge being sought. Privileged knowledge is the kind of “knowing” that can only truly be conveyed through experience—complete with objective happenings and subjective responses and understandings—and, even then, only by one skilled in knowledge conveyance (Berry & Patti, 2015; Hamdan, 2012). Autoethnographers understand that “researchers’ personal experiences of social phenomena are not idiosyncratic (peculiar) but sociocultural (shared)” (Chang, 2016, p. 445). After all, do not researchers live in, and experience, our world too? Chang (2016) cautions that autoethnography is more susceptible to the inherent danger that attends combining “the roles of the subject (the researcher), the object (the researched), and the reporter within the same investigation” (p. 444), ordinarily tempered by the assumption of at least one of those roles by others. Importantly, this study utilized a collaborative method of autoethnography. Collaborative autoethnographies involve two or more researchers, providing some check on the most obvious weaknesses of autoethnographic work, while retaining, or even multiplying, some of its unique benefits. Aberrant experiences may be exposed by their contrast with the experiences of others. The validity of singular experiences is supported by commonality across others, and those experiences so confirmed are also being examined by researchers with access to privileged knowledge about them.

Applying autoethnography as a method to examine how prison architecture affects the delivery of services to prisoners seemed appropriate for two reasons. First, the average individual may not give enough attention to the impacts of architecture to readily perceive them at work or articulate their effect. When called to do so, the same individual may not be prepared to conduct that analysis introspectively. We did not assume that researchers, in their daily lives, were any more attentive to space and its influence than others; we did, however, assume that, when asked to reconsider that topic, they would be better able to make connections between space and experience. We decided to test this first on ourselves through autoethnography.

Second, the average prison professional may have the same limitations in perceiving the impact of architecture on their work as the average individual, justifying why we should turn first to those prison professionals trained in advanced research analyses. Moreover—perhaps unfortunately—the vast majority of prison professionals do not have direct access to make their words available to the academic elite. Instead, their words must come mediated through the reported findings of others. Autoethnography has long been seen as a remedy to such barriers, providing “voice to the voiceless” through the work of academics who are members of otherwise silenced groups (Chang, 2016, p. 446, citing Richards, 2008; for examples of such works, see Blount-Hill and St. John, 2017, and Hamdan, 2012). Of course, the examination of one’s experience of oppressive silencing is different than that of a professional’s daily goings-on, but, as Denshire and Lee (2013) argue,

The everyday processes of professionals are often overlooked as “under the radar,” relegated with no pause for reflection to what too easily can become the “back rooms and corridors” of our working lives. Autoethnography enables the “writing in” of these everyday experiences, re-inscribing the everyday world of practice. (p. 226)

Method

In this study, we used self-reflection as the primary source of experiential data (Chang, 2016). Rigorous structure, and the ability to outline and convey that structure, has been seen as absolutely critical in producing autoethnographic work likely to gain acceptance by technical scientific communities, what Guyotte & Sochacka (2016) term “writing to reach” (p. 5). Four researchers were given a writing prompt instructing them to “[r]eflect on your role within the correctional institution” providing “experiences or observations that have affected your ability to effectively carry out your duties.” These reflections were to be written in document form and were to include consideration of issues around prison capacity, location, setting, and layout. The prompt provided a series of questions to consider (e.g., “was [the prison] very close to the homes of people, businesses”), but autoethnographers were told to “describe your interactions as you please.” In addition, the prompt defined important concepts (for example, specifically clarifying that layout referred to the “physical blueprint of a facility”) and supplied basic information to assist the writers in putting words to observations (for instance, defining “radial design” for use in describing applicable prison layouts).

It should be noted that only one of the autoethnographers had ever ventured into this methodology prior to involvement in this project. Thus, some effort was made within the instructions of the prompt to make clear what was expected in writing a recollective record. They were told that their narratives could be written “as a journal or whatever writing style most adequately conveys your experiences as you felt them.” The autoethnographers were encouraged to refer to documentary evidence of their past experience through the use of “artifacts, pictures, journals, e-mails, texts, calendars, or anything that refreshes our memories . . .” (see Chang, 2016; Blount-Hill and St. John, 2017; Stahike Wall, 2016).

The construction of the initial recollective records took place between 2016 and 2017. Once the initial writing was completed, the lead researcher and a fellow autoethnographer undertook the initial round of narrative analysis, combing for commonalities and striking differences in the perceived impacts of architecture on the delivery of services. While only the lead researcher had previous experience in the analysis of autoethnography, the other researcher who participated in this phase was experienced in qualitative studies. Using accepted methods of qualitative analysis (i.e., those used to code and analyze qualitative interviews) to review the recollective records was one way to ensure academic rigor in the study. Once this was completed, an additional researcher was enlisted to act as a quality, neutrality, and methodology evaluator. The evaluative role was necessary as a bulwark against selective analysis and bias against group-think. Moreover, even at the analysis stage, only the lead researcher was well-versed in correctional architecture, with the neutral evaluator having limited experience in the area. This was important to the analysis as it should quell the concern that the writers would have biased their recollections to fit a preordained conclusion.

After the first round of analysis was completed, the analyzing researchers created an individualized reactive prompt for each autoethnographer to encourage further exploration of topics arising from what was written in their initial narratives. Following second submissions of recollective records, these were analyzed by two researchers using the same methods as in the initial round. The two researchers began outlining prominent themes and common findings as well as areas of important distinction. This outline was reviewed by the evaluating researcher to ensure clarity, validity, and impartiality. Finally, before the completed composition of this manuscript, all autoethnographers engaged in an iterative editing process, following the sequential model of collaborative writing (see Guyotte & Sochacka, 2016), to ensure that all voices were accurately reflected in the telling of our collective story.

One very important ethical consideration in autoethnography is that records not reveal information that could lead to the identification of other actors in the autoethnographers’ stories (Chang, 2016; Stahike Wall, 2016). This point was highlighted in the writing prompt:

Any anecdotes that involve someone other than you must be written in a non-identifiable manner. The use of fictitious names, the omission of specific dates, addresses, etc. is necessary. The final product will be edited so that a given narrative cannot be drawn back to a specific author.

Confidentiality on the part of the autoethnographer to nonparticipating others is, in many ways, the most important measure of the writer’s skill and expertise in the form. Those who fail to protect nonparticipating others do not meet the quality of researcher required to credibly conduct autoethnography. This in mind, screening for identifying information was done (a) at the level of authors’ self-editing of narratives, (b) by analyzing researchers, (c) by the evaluating researcher, (d) as authors edited the final manuscript, and (e) as authors engaged in a final review of the manuscript specifically to ensure anonymity.

Sample

By nature, autoethnographic samples are small, but it is incumbent upon the researcher to disclose the relevant characteristics of the subjects all the same. This is especially true when the autoethnography is collaborative and an important component of the study is its drawing on different perspectives.

Here, we analyze the autoethnographic narratives of four individuals, ages 26 through 35 years with between 2 and more than 20 years of experience as professionals providing in-prison services. One of the authors is a correctional officer of supervisory rank, another a therapeutic counselor, a third a professor, and with experience as both counselor and professor. The sample consisted of two Blacks and two Whites, three males, and one female. One of the autoethnographers had attained completion of a Master of Art degree (in social work), another had obtained the Doctor of Philosophy (in criminology), and two currently enrolled in PhD programs, but not yet completed. There was some diversity in the prisons where these individuals worked as well. Northeastern United States was well represented, but one author worked in a facility in the Southeast. Their experience spanned adult and juvenile facilities, those housing women, men, and a combination of the two. The size of the prison populations varied greatly, with two authors primarily working in prisons with capacities in the low-to-mid hundreds, and the others with significant experience in prison complexes housing multiple thousands.

Findings

The autoethnographers all described elements of SLS as having an impact on their work in prisons. Their descriptions provided insight into the architecture of carceral institutions and how design can facilitate or detract from service provision.

Space—Capacity and Location

A consistent theme was the relative size of the facilities to that of the people in custody. Ethnographer A wrote about the ease of working in a smaller facility:

The inmate to officer ratio [in the facility I worked] was lower than it would be in a large state prison that held 2,000 or more inmates. This allowed officers to identify both strengths and weaknesses in the inmate’s behavior and their willingness to participate in programs. If the goal is to prepare an inmate for life outside of prison then a much more individualized approach would be effective.

Relative size of a prison population is about more than architecture. Lower ratios between correctional staff and prisoner numbers assist in officers being able to commit the attention and individualized service that encourages rehabilitation (Beijersbergen, Dirkzwager, van der Laan, & Nieuwbeerta, 2013; Tartaro, 2002). However, architecture is a key factor. One example involved mention of the size of rooms. Some rooms were too small for the number of individuals they needed to contain, and there were instances where there were not enough seats for group-based activities. Ethnographer B wrote,

Spacing was always an issue. The classrooms were designed for about 10 participants . . . . I remember having upwards of 15 to 16 participants. Space constraints have led to inmates sitting on tables, fighting over seats, and throwing chairs, which makes for a tense environment. Facility managers have responded by bolting furniture to the ground, which has done nothing to reduce overcrowding. There was not much we could do to configure the spacing because the chairs and desks were bolted down. I think some of the youth were frustrated the desk and chairs were bolted down for security reasons because it limited their movement in the classroom. It helped in a way because the youth could not move around as they pleased, which helped make the sessions more manageable.

Several facilities lack the number of rooms needed for existing or new programs, or for staff to complete their work in a timely fashion. When many staff have to share one room or computer to do their work, this creates frustration. According to Ethnographer B, “This caused tension in the workplace because no one really had their own space to call their own.” Not all facilities deal with space concerns and these concerns were not identical across programs even in the same facility. Ethnographer D was able to compare experiences of crowding and adequate space:

When there were less inmates in the trailer during group sessions I noticed more compliance and openness to therapeutic services they were provided. It was quieter. I could observe participants completing their exercises and soliciting assistance from each other and myself. However, when that number doubled it became more challenging of a group to keep under instructional control.

Location was another component of space that ethnographers discussed. Ethnographer A worked in a facility that was surrounded by many acres of land, physically isolated yet calming. The ethnographer’s experiences at this rural facility were much different from those at urban facilities. Contraband was far more prevalent in urban facilities. At the rural facility, people in custody were allowed to do supervised gardening, which was a positive and empowering experience for many of them, one of many rehabilitative experiences:

Growing food was the job I put them to work, but I think that any task that I would have given that allowed [people in custody] to take ownership, responsibility, and pride would have had the same effect. This is a new experience for many of the inner-city gang members that I have encountered.

Ethnographer C taught classes in a state correctional facility for women located near a maximum-security facility. People in custody would be transferred from the maximum to the medium-security facility when their sentences were nearly complete. People in custody in the medium-security facility could spend considerably more time outside both during yard time and walking between buildings. The close proximity between the facilities gave the feel of a prison community, but the facilities were far enough away from major cities that it was difficult for family members and significant others to consistently visit people in custody. Ethnographer D recounted an instance in which facility location played a role in an incarcerated person’s behavior:

He was placed on suicide watch after swallowing a bar of soap. When we spoke about the root of the behavior, it was because his parental visitations kept getting rescheduled and canceled. A follow up was conducted with the parent, to find out that the location of the facility made it difficult for her to travel there.

In another instance, Ethnographer D noted how distance made travel to work difficult from the service provider side:

I told myself that I was not returning to work again because this facility is located too far from home. I love working with the people there. Even the staff are friendly but it’s just too far. However, here I am back. I love what I do and the affinity I feel teaching inmates more than I do a regular class

Layout

Prison layout is intended to ensure that correctional officers are able to oversee and control the movement of people in custody at all times. Ethnographer A believed that prisons designed to control people in custody through barriers are not conducive to rehabilitation:

If a true investment into rehabilitation and reintegration is what is wanted, then the building needs to be designed with a more open concept and less barriers in mind. There is an architectural term that form follows function. If the function of the prison shifted from that of a punitive institution to a more rehabilitative facility then the form of the facility would change.

Large facilities, with lots of locked steel doors, guarantee separation and incapacitation, but the writer seems to say that rehabilitation of incarcerated persons is best achieved through fewer barriers to movement. Such an architectural change would require a shift in prison philosophy. That prisons are designed to control movement spills over to facility staff and volunteers. Entering and leaving facilities is a time-consuming process that requires visitors to be fully searched. Ethnographer C spoke about navigating security each time he entered the facility and how this affected his class time:

Security protocols shortened class time because of the duration of time needed to conduct pat downs, bag/materials scans, empty their pockets, remove their shoes, leave their keys, money, and nearly every other non-task essential item in a locker, walk through a metal detector, traverse locked doors, wait for inmates to pass through, wait at each checkpoint in the prison, walks to each checkpoint, and the added time it took students to arrive at class because they were rarely released with sufficient time for class to begin as scheduled. The shortened length of class time simply meant I could not cover as much of the course material during the semester. I had to cut at least three full lesson/discussions.

The autoethnographer likened the experience to airport security. There are many security checkpoints depending on the facility, and many facilities require an officer escort. The amount of time it takes to navigate facility security sacrifices program time, anywhere from a few minutes to upward of an hour. This time cannot be made up because program instructors are required to leave at a preset time.

In the campus layout, where unconnected prison buildings make up an overall complex, people in custody, staff, and volunteers have to travel outside to get from one building to another. It seems getting to go outsides several times per day is a net positive for people in custody, with the exception of cold winter nights, but this necessitates additional staff remaining outside at most times of the day to supervise their movement. Although outdoor access can be comforting, gates and fences lined with several layers of barbed and razor wire are reminders of the highly secure environment. The telephone pole style is an arrangement in which the facility layout is parallel and perpendicular corridors lead to different areas in the prison—cell blocks, control centers, cafeteria, and program area. Ethnographer C wrote, “Without experience, these hallways are difficult to navigate to get to one’s destination.” Another of the facilities resembled a high-rise brownstone with several floors, similar to metropolitan building designs. According to Ethnographer D, “[this layout] made it easier to supervise the youth because I could move from floor to floor relatively easy.”

Setting

Ethnographers discussed the setting of the facilities in which they worked. These discussions centered on both dilapidation and sensory inputs. Classrooms in several facilities are old, not well maintained, and have outdated furniture and equipment. Ethnographer C complained,

The chalkboards [in the facility classroom] are at least two decades old, the chalk is worn down if there is any in the room, the rooms almost never appear clean despite the overall lack of clutter, and the minimal décor on the walls gives the feeling of being in a junior high school classroom rather than a college setting. I do not know if my students were affected by this, but I can only imagine how much more they could do and how many more tasks they could complete with educational resources, such as computers and greater access to academic and other literature.

Other autoethnographers spoke of how desks and chairs are often covered in chalk and appear messy and not conducive to productive work. Ethnographer D related the following story:

There was a major fight between the inmates. Correctional officers got hurt, I saw an inmate get sprayed with pepper spray and continue to fight outside the classroom we were assigned . . . a kid stood there bleeding, screaming about his eyes . . . the next day where we were placed in the same area and the dried up blood was visible. I asked an officer about it and was told that it was left there to send a message.

Incarcerate persons are responsible for the vast majority of cleaning in many facilities and some of them proudly boasted of how clean the facility was due to their work.

In terms of sensory features, room temperature was a consistent theme. Temperatures in secure facilities are almost never ideal. It is either the case that rooms are too hot or too cold. Ethnographer A noted, “if it is hot outside, it is hotter in the jails. If it’s cold outside it’s colder inside . . . When it is raining on the outside, it’s raining in the inside and it leaks a lot when it’s raining.” Ethnographer C supported the notion of needing greater attention to climate control:

During the cold winter months when the heaters are on, rooms are too hot and when they are off it is too cold. The opposite is true in the summer. The air conditioning makes it freezing cold. It doesn’t take much for me to sweat and when it was hot in the classrooms I would sweat a fair amount. The only option was when the students all agreed it was too hot, one would open a window to let the cold winter air even the temperature.

Thermal comfort is important because participant engagement in programs and activities decreases when room temperatures are uncomfortable. Ethnographer B discussed how temperature can affect mood and productivity:

Participants were less likely to be engaged when they deemed the room temperature as uncomfortable. This provided another obstacle that service providers have to work through. The participants will either be distracted, too sleepy, too hot, too cold, and will become irritable. Overtime, you learned that the room temperature had a role in fluctuation in the participants’ and staffs’ moods.

Temperature is something that service providers and volunteers have to manage as a factor effecting attentiveness and productivity.

Ethnographers also mentioned odors in the prison. Ethnographer A said, “I have been inside many prisons and the one smell that always hits me is the smell of bleach. I tell students that prisons smell like bleach, paint, and floor wax.” Ethnographer C described a prison facility where

The air inside prisons has a mildly unpleasant odor as though fresh air is not circulating through the building. Smells were a subtle mix of body odor, feet, and cafeteria food, but rarely powerful enough to bother me. I assume the smells were even an issue because of the poor ventilation.

Ethnographer B added, “The smells in the jails are always unique, but never good. As long as I have worked there, the smells are something you just do not get used to.”

Noise was another focus of discussion. “There is frequent noise from the ceiling as people upstairs walk across the thinly constructed floors above. There was always noise of conversation when several inmates or COs were together and sounds of metal gates slamming and doors locking,” Ethnographer C wrote. Ethnographer A added,

The noise was not bad except during mass movements. The hallway would fill with inmates going to chow or laundry call and they would all start talking to each other. This added with the echoing effect of a large hallway made the place loud for a few minutes. Other than that, our prison was fairly quiet.

Ethnographer B said, regarding noise, “It can be eerily quiet or really loud depending on where you are and what you are doing in the jail.” Thus, upon reflection it appears that sensory conditions influenced the experience of a facility to make it either more or less compatible with rehabilitative treatment.

Discussion: Architecture, “The Missing Link”

The idea that architecture can influence the behavior of occupants, combined with the fact that both people in custody and officer perspectives and attitudes are similarly affected, should encourage reevaluating our present-day facility structures. The SLS evaluative framework for correctional buildings involves rethinking society’s principles and goals regarding criminals. Ultimately, if the SLS of a facility is not conducive to rehabilitative service, it cannot yield optimal benefits. For instance, if a facility is over capacitated, located in a place where maintaining social connections are difficult, incarcerated persons are placed in crowded spaces, and the facility lacks cleanliness, one should not be surprised about deficiencies in the effectiveness of services provided.

New generation facilities address overcrowding, improve surveillance for officers, and foster relationships between people in custody and officers (Applegate & Paoline, 2007; Williams et al., 1999). However, while security is empirically linked to problems of overcrowding, poor surveillance, and the absence of healthy officer–incarcerated person relationships, there are several other factors that can increase the safety of the occupants in a facility. Applegate and Paoline (2007) find that the design of a facility can improve the sensory conditions we have outlined. Nonetheless, the inclusion of a design that considers not only the spatial capacity but also the spatial location, layout, and setting of a correctional facility can provide an environment that will increase prosocial behavior, enhancing overall safety among people in custody and other occupants while also ensuring a fair chance for success post release.

While this was only an exploratory study, it is always important to provide some guidance for policymakers’ consideration. With this in mind, we have attempted to outline what an ideal facility may look like when considering SLS with a goal of increasing service efficacy and the process of rehabilitation.

Newman (1972) introduced four types of space: private space, semi-private space, semi-public space, and public space. An ideal facility should allow for easy surveillance by staff, while simultaneously giving incarcerated persons a sense of ownership and privacy, a sentiment aligned with Sommer (1971). Perceptions of ownership and privacy decrease some of the unwanted outcomes of overcrowding, such as assault (Lahm, 2009). This is especially important for the rehabilitation and safety of all occupants, considering that, the more perceptions of safety deteriorate, the more difficult it becomes to rebuild (Vogler & Jørgensen, 2005). Furthermore, a sense of ownership and privacy may also need to be extended to service providers, as highlighted by Ethnographer B’s take on the lack of personal work space: Even though the frustration is apparent surrounding the limited work space, we are working with the spaces as they are being provided.

If possible, the location of the facility should be closer to the community to allow for easier visitation and to soften the “us versus them” dichotomy created when we banish individuals from the community. If this is not feasible, we suggest that we borrow from the Open, Transparent, and Inclusive (OTI) design’s reachability component, which encourages placing a facility near transportation systems (Blount-Hill et al., 2017). This becomes increasingly relevant as studies indicate that incarcerated persons who are able to maintain social ties with the outside community have lower rates of recidivism (Baumer, O’Donnell, & Hughes, 2009). Another means of evoking feelings of social connectivity between person and home is the use of more windows (Volger & Jorgensen, 2005).

The layout of the facility should factor in research findings showing that campus-style facilities are correlated with positive behavioral outcomes among people in custody. It may be that this correctional layout also addresses overcrowding. Separation of offenders in multiple facilities should mean lower numbers of incarcerated persons housed in individual buildings. In addition, the room or cell is a primary part of a facility’s layout and should be limited to double and single cells. Borrowing from new-generation designs, the removal of bars and other physical barriers between officer and incarcerated person and the creation of open living areas for people in custody also hold promise. While we lack much anecdotal evidence from our present study on facility layout, this recommendation is in accord with current literature.

Finally, the setting of a facility would ideally ensure that buildings are not deteriorating and that all essential elements are working (e.g., locks, alarms, or toilets). Humane environments should be provided, specifically in housing units and the physical spaces where rehabilitative programming takes place. Moreover, the sensory inputs should be considered when maintaining the built environ. This may mean access to natural light through the positioning of the building or the installation of windows, for instance. Proper ventilation, adequate temperatures, and sound level control must also be present. Moran and Jewkes (2015) promote the use of color, softer furnishings, access to outdoor spaces, the presence of greenery, art, and natural light in correctional facilities, all of which aid in sensory stimulation and reduces boredom for both incarcerated persons and, arguably, all occupants including service providers.

Although this study cannot show a causal link between implementation and the environmental conditions that participants and staff utilize, there is much to draw from it. Ethnographers’ consensus that class size, uncomfortable temperature, unpleasant smells, and lack of physical cleanliness are active components of effective service provision warrants greater study and policy consideration. If the persons who are delivering rehabilitative services point out conditions unfavorable to their tasks, one should consider how to achieve more conducive environments. Of course, there are limitations within the setting of a secure facility, but, at the least, some of these obstacles can be resolved. While limited in generalizability due to the sample size of authors and the mixture of experiences and contexts, this study does suggest the need for improvement in the state of our correctional facilities.

Alongside applicable policy interventions, researchers must continue to reframe their agendas to incorporate the experiences of practitioners. Examining prison architecture from a practitioner perspective helped in conceptualizing a framework for correctional architecture, and we argue this is a strategy that should continue. Furthermore, operationalization of SLS components for additional study would provide greater insight for correctional architecture studies.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

This paper was inspired by conversations with people in custody, correctional personnel, and other service providers. This is a part of an ongoing research agenda that seeks to bridge remaining gaps between the fields of criminology and criminal justice and architectural design theory. As long as correctional facilties exist as a source for rehabilitation, the physical design should match the ideology. We would like to thank the journal editor and reviewers for providing us with substantive feedback, as well as Delores Jones-Brown, Jane Arsovska, and Hung-En Sung (John Jay College of Criminal Justice) for introductions to this methodology.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Author Biographies

Victor J. St. John, MA, is a doctoral student and adjunct professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. He is Director of Research and Analysis with the NYC Board of Correction.

Kwan-Lamar Blount-Hill, JD, is a senior research manager at the NYC Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice.

Douglas Evans, PhD, is a project director and senior investigator with the John Jay College of Criminal Justice Research and Evaluation Center.

Dave Ayers, MA, is an assistant professor at the University of West Georgia Department of Criminology.

Samantha Allard, MS, oversees the programmatic service provision for incarcerated youth in NYC jails with a partnered agency.

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