Male and female employees' perceptions of prison work: Is there a difference?

In the descriptions of what employment is like for women working in male prisons, one discovers a notable dissimilarity between qualitative and quantitative research. Reports based upon interviews portray the work environment for women as hostile, where female officers suffer discrimination and harassment. In contrast, the relatively few surveys of attitudes discovered no difference in job satisfaction between men and women. This study attempts to clarify our understanding of the work experience for women working in men's prisons through a broad-based comparison of the survey-reported experiences of women and men employed in the federal prison system. Comparisons are made between opinions about supervision, job satisfaction, sense of personal efficacy in working with inmates, and job-related stress. The only significant differences are that women report greater job-reported stress and feel relatively less safe. The actual magnitude of stress differences is small, however, and although female respondents report that prisons are less safe for women, they perceive prisons to be less dangerous than do male respondents.