Disciplinary Incidents in Prison: Effects of Race, Economic Status, Urban Residence, Prior Imprisonment

This article examines the effects of race, economic deprivation, urban background, and criminal justice experience on officially recorded violent and non-violent disciplinary incidents for inmates (n = 2496) released from a northern state prison system. Results of regression analysis indicate that after controlling for important predictor variables, race and prior prison incarceration have no significant main effects on incident rates. Urban background is significantly related to non-violent misconduct only. Economic deprivation is significantly related to nonviolent and violent misconduct. Differential effects by race for prior prison incarceration and employment status are found.