Substance Abuse in Prisons: Causes, Costs, and Solutions
This research report examines the problem of active substance abuse within prison systems, with a focus on how drugs enter facilities, how treatment is often withheld or inadequate, and what consequences follow for incarcerated and released individuals. Drawing on peer-reviewed academic literature, the report discusses subgroup disparities in post-release mortality among Australian inmates, the costs and benefits of community-based drug diversion programs in the United States, and the relationship between co-occurring mental illness and substance abuse as predictors of prison violence. The paper concludes with a call for pragmatic policy reforms and stronger consequences for those who facilitate drug smuggling into correctional facilities.
- Introduction: Overview of drug use and dealing in prisons
- Statement of Purpose: Why studying active prison drug use matters
- Research Design: Peer-reviewed EBSCO sources used exclusively
- Research Findings: Studies on treatment gaps, mortality, diversion, and violence
- Discussion: Policy implications and calls for systemic reform
- Conclusion: Limits of enforcement and need for practical solutions
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper maintains a clear, consistent structure — purpose, design, findings, discussion, conclusion — that mirrors a formal research report format and makes the argument easy to follow.
- It draws on diverse peer-reviewed sources spanning multiple countries (Finland, Australia, the United States), giving the findings comparative breadth without overstating the evidence.
- The discussion section moves beyond summarizing findings to offer a policy-oriented argument, distinguishing between prisoners who need treatment and those who enable drug trafficking — a useful analytical distinction.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates evidence synthesis across multiple studies: rather than reporting each source in isolation, it builds a cumulative argument — from inadequate treatment, to post-release mortality disparities, to diversion program outcomes, to violence prediction — showing how each finding reinforces the overall claim that prison drug policy is systemically insufficient.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with a brief framing introduction before moving into a clearly labeled Statement of Purpose. The Research Design section justifies the use of peer-reviewed sources exclusively. Research Findings presents four studies in sequence, organized thematically. The Discussion section offers the author's interpretive and policy conclusions, and the Conclusion summarizes the core dilemma and calls for actionable reform. The structure is transparent and academically conventional for a short research report.
Introduction
If there are two things that plague prisons the most — other than violence — they would be drug dependency and mental illness. Quite often, both conditions appear together in the same prisoners. However, the problem of active drug use and dealing within prison walls deserves its own focused attention, and that is the subject of this brief research report. The report includes a statement of purpose, a description of the research design, the overall research findings, a discussion section, and a conclusion with a proposed resolution. References to peer-reviewed scholarly literature will support each section. While prisons and their personnel do their best to curb or stop substance abuse, the influx of drugs is never-ending and is brought in through many different methods.
Statement of Purpose
The purpose of this study is straightforward. The body of literature about drug dependency and mental illness as they relate to prisons is substantial. However, literature specifically focused on active drug use inside prisons is considerably harder to find, largely because such behavior occurs covertly and is difficult to track. Whether someone is mentally ill or using drugs can be determined through mental evaluations and drug tests, respectively. Drug use in prison, however, is facilitated through smuggling, deceit, and — in some cases — the complicity of prison personnel who either look the other way or are actively involved in the movement of illegal substances (including prescription drugs used outside their authorized context, such as non-prescription OxyContin abuse).
The core problem is that drugs are making their way into prisons, allowing addicts to continue — or even deepen — their addictions while incarcerated. This makes those individuals harder to manage, more volatile, more prone to violence, and more likely to harm themselves through overdosing or dangerous behavior. The depth and breadth of this problem, as well as what is currently being done to address it, are the central concerns of this report.
References
Forsyth, Simon J., et al. "Striking Subgroup Differences in Substance-Related Mortality After Release from Prison." Addiction 109.10 (2014): 1676–1683. SocINDEX with Full Text. Web. 6 Dec. 2015.
Obstbaum, Yaira, and Sasu Tyni. "Who Receives Substance Abuse Treatment in the 'Real World' of the Prison? A Register-Based Study of Finnish Inmates." Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology & Crime Prevention 16.1 (2015): 76–96. Legal Collection. Web. 6 Dec. 2015.
Wood, Steven R., and Anthony Buttaro, Jr. "Co-Occurring Severe Mental Illnesses and Substance Abuse Disorders as Predictors of State Prison Inmate Assaults." Crime & Delinquency 59.4 (2013): 510–535. ERIC. Web. 6 Dec. 2015.
Zarkin, Gary A., et al. "Lifetime Benefits and Costs of Diverting Substance-Abusing Offenders from State Prison." Crime & Delinquency 61.6 (2015): 829–850. Education Abstracts (H.W. Wilson). Web. 6 Dec. 2015.
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