The Child’s Current Caregiver

Children who live in stable households with nurturing caregivers during their parents’ incarceration are likely to fare better than children who experience family instability as a result of a parent’s confinement Foster care, in particular, carries with it the risk of multiple placement changes and loss of connection to school, community, friends, siblings and extended family. 

      The vast majority (84 percent) of parents incarcerated in state prisons reported to the Bureau of Justice Statistics that at least one of their children was in the care of the other parent. Fifteen percent identified as caregivers the grandparents, 6 percent other relatives and 3 percent reported that at least one child was in a foster home, agency or institution.Responses of mothers and fathers in state prison differed on this survey question. Eighty-eight percent of fathers identified the child’s other parent as the current caregiver, compared to 37 percent of mothers. Sixty-eight percent of mothers, on the other hand, identified a grandparent or other relative as a child’s current caregiver, compared to 17.5 percent of fathers. Finally, mothers were five times more likely than fathers to report that a child was in foster care (11 percent vs. 2 percent, respectively).

      Notwithstanding the Bureau of Justice Statistics survey, accurate estimates are not available of the number of children in foster care who have an incarcerated parent. Although the report tells us how many inmates identified a given type of caregiver, it does not tell us how many children are in each type of care giving arrangement. Thus, we do not know how many children are represented by the 3 percent of inmates who reported that a child was in foster care. Further, the survey makes no attempt to distinguish between relative caregivers who are foster parents and those who provide care outside the formal child welfare system. Other data sources are equally problematic, producing widely varying estimates of this population of children in care.

How does parental incarceration affect children?

Parental incarceration can affect many aspects of a child’s life, including emotional and behavioral well-being, family stability and financial circumstances. Unfortunately, much of the research on the effect of parental incarceration on children’s well-being is of poor quality.

      Some studies suggest that parental incarceration has an independent effect on a child’s behavior, academic performance and mental health.

      There is, however, consensus in the field that these children are exposed to many risk factors and that the effects of parental incarceration on children are subject to a host of variables, including pre-incarceration living arrangements; the quality of the parent-child relationship; the degree to which inmate parents participated in daily care and financial support of their children prior to confinement; children’s current living arrangements; the amount of contact children have with their incarcerated parents; and children’s age, temperament, gender and coping skills, among other factors.

What is the nature and scope of the problem?

Much of what we know about this issue comes from a series of reports by the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) on incarcerated parents and their children, that in turn, are based upon periodic national surveys of inmates in state and federal prisons. The latest such report was released in August 2008.2 It found that, in 2007, slightly more than 1.7 million children under age 18 had a parent in state or federal prison, representing 2.3 percent of the total U.S. child population. The number of children with a father in prison increased from 881,500 in 1991 to more than 1.5 million in 2007, a 77 percent increase. During that time, the number of children with a mother in prison increased by 131 percent, from 63,900 to 147,400.

          In 2007, 744,200 male prison inmates had minor children, compared to 65,500 women inmates. Most prisoners had at least one child under age 18 (52 percent of state inmates and 63 percent of federal inmates). Sixty-two percent of women in state prison and 56 percent of female inmates in federal prison were parents of minor children, compared to 51 percent of male state prisoners and 63 percent of male federal inmates.

What do we know about these children’s race and age?

         In 2007, the population of minor children of incarcerated parents consisted of approximately 484,100 white, non-Hispanic children (one in 110 white children), 767,400 black, non-Hispanic children (one in 15 black children), and 362,800 Hispanic children (one in 41 Hispanic children). Black (54 percent) and Hispanic (57 percent) men in state prison were more likely than white men (45 percent) to be parents. The likelihood that women in state prison were parents did not vary by race.

         About half of these children were age 9 or younger. Thirty-two percent were between the ages of 10 and 14, and 16 percent were between the ages of 15 and 17.