Research findings on the psychological effects of solitary confinement have been strikingly consistent since the early nineteenth century. Studies have identified a wide range of frequently occurring adverse psychological reactions that commonly affect prisoners in isolation units. The prevalence of psychological distress is extremely high. Nonetheless, use of solitary confinement in the United States vastly increased in recent decades. Advocates defend its use, often citing two recent studies to support claims that isolation has no significant adverse psychological effects, including even on mentally ill people. Those studies, however, are fundamentally flawed, their results are not credible, and they should be disregarded. Critically and comprehensively analyzing the numerous flaws that compromise this recent scholarship underscores the distinction between methodological form and substance, the danger of privileging quantitative data irrespective of their quality, and the importance of considering the fraught nature of the prison context in which research results are actually generated. Solitary confinement has well-documented adverse effects. Its use should be eliminated entirely for some groups of prisoners and greatly reduced for others.

中文翻译：

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单独监禁的心理影响：系统的批判

自十九世纪初以来，关于单独监禁的心理影响的研究结果一直非常一致。研究确定了广泛发生的不良心理反应，这些反应通常会影响隔离单位中的囚犯。心理困扰的患病率非常高。但是，最近几十年来，在美国使用单独监禁的情况大大增加。拥护者捍卫它的使用，经常援引两项最新研究来支持声称隔离没有明显的不良心理影响，甚至对精神病患者也没有影响。但是，这些研究从根本上来说是有缺陷的，其结果并不可信，因此应予以忽略。批判性地综合分析了危害这一最新奖学金的众多缺陷，强调了方法学形式和实质之间的区别，定量数据不论其质量如何均具有特权的危险，以及考虑实际研究结果所处的监狱环境充满生气的重要性。产生。单独监禁具有充分记录的不利影响。对于某些囚犯，应完全消除使用它，而对于其他囚犯，则应大大减少使用。