Solitary Confinement

Solitary confinement has been used to breakdown and secure prisoners since the beginning of time. It can have extreme psychological, emotional, and physical impacts on a prisoner.

Psychological Consequences

Prisoners who are left too themselves with no interaction can suffer from psychological damages. A person needs interaction. Quite often the only sound some in solitary confinement will hear is the outside world and the sound of the food gate opening and closing. The prisoner is monitored via a camera to keep an eye on him or her. Confinement can be given for the prisoner’s safety, as punishment, or as a safety measure to the general prison population. Sometimes, law officials have used it to break or wear down a prisoner.

A prisoner left alone may develop nervous ticks, may begin to talk to him self, or may escape in to sleep and stupors. Some rant and scream at the outside world. Psychological breakdown can occur quickly.

Emotional Consequences

Emotionally prisoners sentenced to solitary confinement have been known to go on crying sprees, to begin to confess to anything and everything, or shut down. The fact that the person has no one with whom they can express their emotions can be a tragic and damaging situation. Sometimes law officers use this method of isolation known as solitary confinement and prison officials in an attempt to gain information or even to gain an admission of guilt form the confined prisoner. It can be a very effective device.

Physical Consequences

Some people on confinement begin a rigorous physical program. Tis routine helps to ass the time and keep him or her fit. Other people will simply sleep a lot and lose physical strength and health. The sleeping helps them to pass the time. Either way, solitary confinement can affect the physical condition of the prisoner’s body. It can be for the negative or for the positive.

Solitary confinement for prisoners has existed for a long time. And it has been used in many countries and in many cultures. It is an effective measure to use on prisoners. The confinement can be issued for quite a few reasons. It could be a punishment, a safety measure, or a means of protecting the general prison population. Whatever the reason for solitary confinement, it can result in psychological, emotional, or physical consequences. These consequences are usually of the negative nature for the prisoner.