2015 Association for Women in Psychology Conference

This 4-hour workshop provides in-depth preparation for the AWP IMP-sponsored session during regular conference hours. The workshop, facilitated by White Women in addition to a Woman of Color, uses a combination of psychoeducational and experiential approaches to raise critical awareness around White Women’s privilege. The first step in unlearning racism is to acknowledge that as White Women, we have all internalized racist messages to some degree. Through dialogue, our agenda as facilitators is to help each participant identify where you are in the process of unlearning and challenging racism as White Women. We will also discuss what it means to be White and explore examples of White privilege, distinguish between overt and covert racism, identify the process of racial tokenism, discuss principles of anti-racist action and advocacy, and provide strategies for overcoming racism within our communities and ourselves. As facilitators, we will encourage personal racial self-analysis and awareness with a critical consciousness through multimedia material, handouts, and opportunities for small and large group work. We are aware that White Women attending this workshop may be at different stages in unlearning racism, and recognize this material is inherently intense and oftentimes uncomfortable. Thus, we encourage self-care throughout.

Confronting our areas of ignorance and making mistakes is inevitable and necessary for our growth in activism work. At the same time, many of us have witnessed the “call out culture” of social justice spaces, in which members of our communities are silenced, superficially told to “check their privilege,” or shunned when they have unknowingly enacted a microaggression. As feminist scholars and therapists, we are inspired by writer Ngọc Loan Trần’s practice of “Calling In” – a compassionate, connecting way of inviting people to reflect on the relational and community effects of their words and actions - as a transformational response to microaggressions that occur within activist spaces. Aligned with principles of restorative justice, the focus of calling in is addressing and healing the impact of hurtful acts within a community, rather than on punishing an “offender.” We propose that calling each other in, instead of simply calling out, can facilitate repair and reconnection following a microaggression, promote greater openness and creativity in activist communities, and contribute to building sustainable social justice movements. This experiential workshop will offer participants opportunities to explore ways to be effective allies, activists, and restorative justice workers when working in multiracial coalitions and restorative justice movements. Participants will critically analyze power dynamics and the impact of “call out culture” in social and restorative justice work and communities. Through our explorations, we will learn principles of Ngoc Loan Tran’s practice of “Calling In” and discover ways to create more relational and healing spaces within social change movements. Participants will be invited to apply principles of “Calling In” in pairs and small groups throughout the workshop.

This invited symposium presents three mixed-method empirical studies examining incarcerated women’s experiences within the criminal justice system. We will explore women’s pathways to incarceration, mental health outcomes associated with a trauma-informed, gender-specific curriculum for women serving life sentences, and feminist principles in mentoring relationships among community and incarcerated women. 

Presentation I.  Exploring Women’s Pathways to the Criminal Justice System 

Shannon Lynch, Ph.D., Idaho State University,  Dana DeHart, PhD, University of South Carolina, Joanne Belknap, Ph.D., Chris DeCou, BS, Idaho State University 

In response to increasing rates of incarceration of women, researchers have studied gender differences in pathways to the justice system. In particular, women and girls report more experiences of intimate interpersonal violence and greater mental health difficulties than male offenders. Women are also more likely to describe use of substances associated with their offenses. As part of a mixed-methods, multisite study of women’s pathways to jail, a subset (N=115) of participants from a sample of 491 randomly selected women in jails in four regions of the U.S. completed extensive life history calendar interviews.  Our multi-disciplinary research team reviewed these in-depth interviews and created case summaries highlighting onset and extent of interpersonal violence and adversity, types of perpetrator(s), onset and extent of substance use, path into criminal offending, and onset and extent of mental health concerns. We will use these profile summaries to explore intersections of trauma, mental health and substance use in the women’s narratives, to elucidate potential targets for prevention and intervention, and to identify common paths to the justice system. These findings have the potential to inform the development and implementation of prevention efforts with at-risk community populations and gender responsive programming within the corrections system. 

Presentation II.  “I’m Learning How to Live”: Short term and Follow-up Outcomes of a New Intervention with Incarcerated Women with Life Sentences

Gina Fedock, MSW, Doctoral Candidate 

Michigan State University
Incarcerated women with life sentences are a small, but growing sub-population of adults in prison. Strikingly, women with life sentences are often excluded from treatment programming within prisons, given that such programming is reserved for women with shorter sentences or those preparing for re-entry into the community. They have not even been considered a target population for intervention, as they are rarely, if ever, included in samples for new intervention development and testing. This study examines mental health outcomes for a pilot of a new trauma-informed and gender-specific intervention entitled Beyond Violence with a sample of 26 incarcerated women with life sentences in a state prison. Surveys including measures of depression, anxiety, PTSD, serious mental illness, and forms of anger expression were administered at pre-intervention, post-intervention, and three months following completion. Focus groups occurred with the groups at post-intervention, and individual semi-structured interviews were conducted at the follow-up time point. Results will be shared in regards to the changes in mental health and anger measures over time, as well as the themes of the focus groups and interviews. Lastly, a discussion of future practice and research implications for work focused on incarcerated women with life sentences will be included.

 Presentation III. Growth-fostering Relationships and Transforming Self-perceptions: Feminist Principles in the Mentoring of Women in Prison and Beyond

 

Dawn M. Salgado, PhD

Pacific University

 Previous research examining women’s services and programming while incarcerated have generally been found to be underfunded, inadequate, or inconsistent with empirically-based needs of the population. As new interventions rely on incorporating strength-based, gender-responsive, and restorative justice approaches into their programmatic structure and theory, there is a growing body of evidence suggesting interventions for incarcerated women can be effective at increasing health and well-being, creating opportunities for successful reintegration, and interrupting the cycle of re-incarceration. The current mixed method study examines experiences of community mentors and incarcerated women (N = 29) as they discuss relational and programmatic features associated with their involvement. Results will highlight feminist-based practices and principles typified in these relationships focusing on connection and similarities, empathy and acceptance, and empowerment and effectiveness. In addition, the presentation will discuss incarcerated women’s transformative experiences and the ability of the program to provide a seamless set of services, beginning in prison and extending after release.  This information is directly applicable to the development and implementation of cost-effective strategies to holistically serve incarcerated women. 

This symposium includes presentations representing chapters from an upcoming edited collection on women’s experiences of migration. Panelists explore the gendered personal and emotional costs of the dislocation of space in the contemporary global political/economic regime. Even though popular notions continue to perceive the immigrant as male, the presence of females is central to the process. And yet, most published work on immigration does not focus on the gendered processes that underlie the experience of migration. With very few exceptions, even when data about women and girls are presented, a gender analysis of the implications of these data tends to be absent. Through a combination of empirical research, personal narratives, and clinical insights about women immigrants and refugees, these presentations contribute an innovative and multicultural approach to the knowledge base on women’s experience of migration. The extant psychological literature about women who migrate tends to pathologize their experiences and/or emphasize the needs of clinical populations (e.g., studies of depression among immigrants). In other words, the focus tends to be on illness-based studies. By contrast, this panel provides other perspectives and healthy alternatives, including those of survival, resilience, and success. Presenters provide a gender analysis of women’s and girls’ experiences of migration, not simply examining women as subjects of scholarship, but exploring ways in which gender is an organizing structure of power relations. These presentations do not simply examine data about girls and/or women, but provide a feminist analysis in which gender is a central organizing axis of power, alongside other social structures such as age, class, race, ethnicity, nationality, and so on. Specific topics explored by these presenters include gender identity, acculturation, language, food, violence, intersectionality and the psychology of place and space.

This symposium explores applications and implications of restorative justice in various contexts, including research, therapy and performance. Presenters explore interventions that address social change, privilege and oppression, feminist consciousness and responsibility. These presentations contribute an innovative and multicultural approach to notions of restoration, healing, and obligation. Integrating analyses of race, class, gender, and sexuality, panelists contextualize their respective interventions within institutional and political structures. Presenters will tackle central thematic questions including: What is restorative justice? What is intended to be “restored”? What does it mean to be concerned about restorative justice in areas of research, psychotherapy, culturally sensitive activism and health? How do we situate ourselves as knowledge producers in discourses of restorative justice? One presenter examines cycles of violence against women and ways in which performance can disrupt systems of domination. Describing an intervention in Argentina, the presenter explores how rurality, tribal culture, the Catholic church, and militarism intersect in the lives and work of a group of feminist activists. A co-authored presentation explores how reflexivity and reflexive practice might be conceived as political action, and how it shapes each step of the academic research process. Presenters critically examine reflexivity in the context of producing scholarship, teaching, and higher education administration. Another presenter asks: How is therapy a tool of restorative justice? Another examines poetry as a tool for social change. Finally, one presentation addresses evidence from repeated population-based samples of high school students to show that, contrary to common opinion, sexual minority adolescent girls actually have a higher incidence than their completely heterosexual counterparts of both pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. Some of the potential factors and influences that may lead to these outcomes will be discussed, alongside information on recent efforts in public schools to foster the sexual health of sexual minority girls.

In March 2014, several AWP long-time-members organized a workshop at a one-time Boston conference titled, "A revolutionary moment: women's liberation in the late 1960s and early 1970s." We offered a panel about AWP and about feminist psychology, its promise and its actuality. We attended many amazing other sessions and spent a lot of free time together. We decided on the basis of this experience to offer a session here in SF on the value of looking back to the early days of women's liberation and AWP. More than memories were involved - we found ourselves dealing with issues of meaning, relevance, and life review.

Over the past two decades, visual methods have grown increasingly popular in narrative, critical, feminist, and participatory research (Prosser, 2011). Mapping and photovoice, in particular, have been lauded by users as accessible and creative tools capable of transcending many of the limitations of conventional text-based methods (Futch & Fine, 2014; Wang & Burris, 1997). At the very least, mapping and photovoice provide enticing alternatives to positivist methods, particularly when working with populations who may experience language and literacy barriers. At their best, they expand the ways we express, represent, and construct our multiple selves; they shift power and agency into the participant’s hands; they provoke critical dialogue between visually documented lived experiences and sociopolitical forces; and they illuminate tensions, contradictions, and struggle as they highlight diversity within, and across, shared experiences (e.g., Futch & Fine, 2014; Katsiaficas et al., 2011; Wang & Burris, 1997). This workshop offers a practical introduction to mapping and photovoice. Drawing from our own experiences using these methods, we will guide workshop participants through a brief overview of the epistemological underpinnings of each method; an explanation of how they are used both to generate research data and enrich qualitative analyses; hands-on exercises with both techniques aimed at exemplifying the strengths and limitations of each method; suggestions for how to analyze visual data; and a discussion of the many applications and implications for broadening our epistemological lenses. It is hoped that by the end of this session, participants will see the world differently.