Prevalence and Predictors of Psychopathological Symptoms Among Inmates in Dilla Correction Centre, SNNPR, Ethiopia

Abstract

The study examined the prevalence rate of psychopathological symptoms among prison populations, and their link to gender, age, educational status, term of sentence, crime type and district administration. Totally, 420 participants were selected through multi-stage probability sampling techniques followed by student’s t-test and logistic regressions were employed for data analysis. It was found that 48% (95%CI = -0.08, 0.05) of inmates had been experiencing psychopathological symptoms, which were not significantly different (α=0.05, p = 0.65). Furthermore, a set of predictors could reliably distinguish between inmates with and without psychopathological symptoms (χ2 = 145.913, p = 0.000, df = 5). Thus, except for gender and age, other variables (i.e., educational status, crime type, length of sentences and district administration) were accurate in terms of predicting psychopathological symptoms. On this basis, inmates need greater assistance to become functioning members of society prior and/or later to incarcerations.