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When a person in prison or an institutional environment is aggressive, many begin to question the origins of such aggressive behaviour. Some blame the prison environment, suggesting it is a hotbed of illegal activities that incentivise aggressive acts, whilst others suggest it is due to individual traits already present in the person before they were incarcerated.
Two different theories have attempted to explore these explanations. One of those is the importation model, also known as the dispositional explanation. Established by Irwin and Cressey (1962), the importation model emphasises the individual's characteristics as the cause of the aggression rather than the fault lying with the institution.
Thief, freepik.com/storyset
The dispositional explanation focuses on the individual's disposition in that it emphasises the individual's inherent characteristics they developed before entering the institution being the cause of their aggressive behaviours. Their aggression stems from their personality and other factors, such as social class.
You can read more about this in our article Institutional Aggression in the Context of Prisons.
In reference to social class, this relates to the social norms they were brought up around and the people they knew before entering an institution.
For example, a person who associates with people who deal drugs or commit crimes may continue to perpetuate these behaviours once they have entered prison. They are used to this and may even seek out like-minded individuals.
The importation model was developed by Irwin and Cressey (1962). Prisoners 'import' their behaviours and personality traits from outside into the prison and continue to perpetuate these behaviours once 'inside'.
The importation model is the counter model to the deprivation model, also known as the situational explanation.
Overall, the importation model explores the risk factors associated between a person's disposition and institutional aggression in prisons. So, before looking at some importation model examples of risk factors, let's establish the dispositional explanation of behaviour.
When discussing the dispositional explanation of behaviour, we talk about an individual's characteristics.
Dispositional explanations assign personal attribution to actions or behaviours, suggesting they are a result or cause of feelings, judgements, traits, behaviours, social upbringing and associations, etc. It focuses on the internal, psychological reasoning behind these behaviours, personal and specific to the individual.
Personality and traits of a person, freepik.com/storyset
There are some specific importation model examples of risk factors we can outline here, and we have briefly touched upon them above. They include:
As you can see, each example can affect a person's disposition. The norm in someone's social circle shapes their personality, and they bring these behaviours into an institution through importation. What they are familiar with on the outside will inevitably dictate how they behave on the inside.
Research into the importation model analyses the legitimacy of the theory. Let's explore some notable examples.
Mills et al. (1998) wanted to identify if there was an association between alcohol abuse and inmate aggression.
Under the importation model, such associations would support the theory, as its the inmate's disposition before the prison environment which is causing the behaviours.
The researchers used:
They found that offenders who had issues with alcohol abuse, specifically if they depended quite highly on alcohol, were more likely to be and were more involved in serious incidents than the controls. Those who depended on alcohol had a higher level of aggression.
This supports the importation model, as the prisoners bring aggressive behaviours into the institution.
Delisi et al. (2004) wanted to investigate the association between prison violence and inmate involvement in gangs (both inside and outside of prison).
As the importation model suggests, the prison inmates' violent/aggressive behaviours result from the involvement and inherent characteristics they develop in these gangs, which they bring with them into prison.
The researchers used:
They found that the overall effect of gang membership was lower than first anticipated. Compared to other risk factors, such as chronic offending, violent history and previous incarcerations, gang membership effects were smaller.
Gang members are not more violent than other prisoners, which does not support the idea put forward by the importation model.
Kane and Janus (1981) investigated the demographical risk factors associated with aggression.
This supports the idea of the importation model, as these are the inherent characteristics prisoners have before entering a prison environment; they predispose them, supposedly, to aggression.
They reported to the Federal Prison System (FPS) some demographics that would increase the chances of violence occurring during incarceration:
Past dependence on drugs (such as opiates)
Unemployment
Less education
Similarly, in terms of race and age:
Non-white and younger inmates were more likely to be violent
According to Kane and Janus (1981), this may be due to a lack of support systems for these populations compared to others and how the subculture within non-white and younger inmates may encourage violent solutions.
Those who are unemployed for longer periods of time are more likely to be aggressive and violent. Overall, this supports the importation model.
Gang behaviours, freepik.com/macrovector
Overall, we can say that there is research evidence for and against the importation model. Whilst Mills et al. (1998) and Kane and Janus (1981) support the model, DeLisi et al. (2004) highlight issues with the theory. Problems with such research lie in them being androcentric. They focus on male prisoners, which reduces the generalisability both to the population and female prisoners.
Some argue that the model is too simplistic and ignores other important factors that may incite aggression. Other models, such as the deprivation model, explore other factors affecting aggression.
The deprivation model can be considered the counter model to the importation model in that it emphasises the institution being the cause of aggression in individuals. This is also known as the situational explanation, as the institution is said to be the cause.
In an institution, such as a prison, certain liberties are taken from the inmates, such as freedom and access to certain luxuries. Some of those are:
The loss of autonomy
The loss of liberty
The loss of security
The loss of heterosexual relationships
The loss of luxuries (services and goods)
Sykes (1958) described these deprivations as the pains of imprisonment, and as this would suggest, it causes stress and discomfort for the inmates.
This is not entirely unwarranted, as the institution enacts these deprivations as a form of punishment. The inmates have committed a crime and therefore deserve to be punished in some regard, and lack of such liberties is the punishment. Does this punishment incite aggression? And is this enough of a cause for concern to warrant a change in these systems?
The importation model was developed by Irwin and Cressey (1962). It is the idea that prisoners 'import' their behaviours and personality traits from outside into the prison and continue to perpetuate these behaviours once 'inside'. It attempts to explain aggressive behaviours in institutions.
The dispositional explanation focuses on the individual's disposition in that it emphasises the individual's inherent characteristics they developed before entering an institution being the cause of their aggressive behaviours. Their aggression stems from their personality, in a sense.
The deprivation model argues that the deprivations in an institution (loss of autonomy, liberty, luxuries, etc.) cause aggression, alongside other factors within the institution, such as staff behaviours and environmental factors, whereas the importation model argues the causes of aggression lie in the dispositions of the individuals themselves; they import them into the institution from their previous backgrounds.
Sykes suggested that the 5 pains of imprisonment were:
The importation hypothesis proposes that aggressive behaviours in an institution stem from an individual's dispositions before they entered the institution.
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