(PS7-B45) Experiences of Moral Injury Exposure Among Former Lifers

A significant increase in the number of formerly incarcerated individuals who served life sentences (i.e., lifers) in California has created the opportunity to study aspects of their psychological wellness for the first time. Morally injurious events (MIEs) and their consequences may be a particularly relevant to consider in this population given the typical acts (e.g., murder) and sentences (e.g., 25 years to life) found in the population of lifers. However, no previous studies have explored MIEs in formerly incarcerated populations. The current study sought to describe exposure to MIEs within this population and explore how moral emotions in response to MIEs and important protective factors predict well-being in former lifer’s post-release.

Former lifers currently in reentry in California (N = 41) completed a survey. Participants were asked to a describe the event that most deeply violated their morals or values and caused them the most distress. In response to their indicated event(s), they were asked whether the event(s) reported were their life sentence crime, an event that happened before imprisonment, during imprisonment, or after imprisonment. Participants were then asked to rate their current guilt and shame in response to the event(s) described to capture key moral emotions linked to moral injury. Degree of religiosity was assessed as a potential protective factor. To assess well-being in re-entry, participants completed the Flourishing Scale.  

As expected, a high rate of lifetime MIEs was endorsed in the sample population (97.6%). When asked about the events that most deeply violated their morals, events linked to life sentence crimes (75.6%) and time in prison (56.1%) were very common. Lower levels of MIE-related shame (r = -.58, p < 0.01) and higher levels of religiosity (r = .35, p < 0.05) were associated with greater flourishing in this sample. MIE-related guilt was not significantly associated with flourishing. Given that both MIE-related shame and religiosity showed significant associations with flourishing, we conducted a post-hoc regression analysis to explore whether religiosity would protect against MIE-related shame in predicting flourishing. We found that the overall model was significant (F (34,3) = 9.078, p < 0.001; Adj. R² = 0.396). There was a trending interaction between religiosity and MI-related shame in predicting flourishing (β = 0.284, p = 0.086) such that the relationship between MI-related shame and flourishing was weaker for those with higher religiosity.

Our results demonstrate that moral injury is a relevant construct to explore among former lifers. Persistent shame following MIEs may negatively impact successful re-entry in this population. Future research on the impact of the parole and reentry process on moral emotions and trajectories of MIE-related shame among lifers would be an important line of inquiry.