Confined fathering: an examination of the relationship between fatherhood and the desistance process
Date
2020
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Publisher
University of Delaware
Abstract
This study conducts a secondary qualitative analysis utilizing data from the NIJ-funded Roads Diverge: Long-Term Patterns of Relapse, Recidivism and Desistance for a Re-Entry Cohort project. Guided by theories of desistance and masculinities, this research examines the relationship between identity change, desistance, and fatherhood among a contemporary drug and justice-involved reentry cohort. Specifically, this research asks: How does a cohort of drug and justice-involved men navigate the terrain of fatherhood and desistance over a more than twenty-year time period? Consistent with the identity theory of desistance (IDT), results indicate that fatherhood was instrumental in maintaining a prosocial identity, but only after agentic cognitive transformation had occurred within fathers themselves. This transformation was not a specific event, but usually a process whereby past failures were linked to future failures in a crystallization of discontent, wherein individuals acknowledged a future self they feared becoming. This research contributes to the ongoing theoretical debate in the desistance literature and has implications for future research, legislation, and policies, especially those related to criminal justice reform and reentry.
Description
Keywords
Desistance, Fatherhood, Gender, Identity, Masculinity, Reentry