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Principal investigator:
Sachini Bandara
Johns Hopkins School of Public Health
Email: sbandar2@jhu.edu
Homepage: https://www.jhsph.edu/faculty/directory/profile/3895/sachini-bandara
Sample size: 4064
Field period: 02/14/2018-04/20/2018
Background: Individuals with drug convictions are at heightened risk of poor health, due in part to punitive public policies. This study tests the effects of message frames on: (1) public stigma towards individuals with felony drug convictions and (2) support for four policies in the United States (U.S.) affecting social determinants of health: mandatory minimum sentencing laws, ‘ban-the-box’ employment laws, and restrictions to supple- mental nutrition and public housing programs.
Methods: A randomized experiment (n = 3,758) was conducted in April 2018 using a nationally representative online survey panel in the U.S. Participants were randomized to a no-exposure arm or one of nine exposure arms combining: (1) a description of the consequences of incarceration and community reentry framed in one of three ways: a public safety issue, a social justice issue or having an impact on the children of incarcerated individuals, (2) a narrative description of an individual released from prison, and (3) a picture depicting the race of the narrative subject. Logistic regression was used to assess effects of the frames.
Results: Social justice and the impact on children framing lowered social distance measures and increased support for ban-the-box laws.
Conclusion: These findings can inform the development of communication strategies to reduce stigma and ad- vocacy efforts to support the elimination of punitive polices towards individuals with drug convictions.
Only 29% of respondents were willing to move next door to someone with a felony drug conviction, but 72% of respondents believed this population were able to return to productive lives in the community following release. Only a minority of the public supported less punitive policies towards individuals with felony drug convictions. Forty-five percent of respondents supported eliminating mandatory minimum sentencing for individuals with felony drug convictions. Forty-one percent of respondents supported removing restrictions to SNAP and 40% supported removing public housing restrictions for this population. Forty-two percent of respondents supported enacting ban-the box-policies applicable to individuals with felony drug convictions.
Compared to the control group (29%), participants who read the social justice consequence frame (37%, p=0.04) and the impact on children frame (41%, p<0.01) reported being more willing to live next door to someone convicted of a felony drug crime. The social justice frame was associated with respondents having lower levels of belief in the perceived ability of people with the felony drug convictions to rehabilitate compared to the control group (62% vs 72%, p 0.02). Compared to the control group (45%), the social justice frame was associated with greater policy support for eliminating mandatory minimums (54%, p 0.049). There were no statistically significant differences between the effect of the frames’ on support for eliminating mandatory minimum sentencing laws.
Both the social justice (55%, p <0.01) and the impact on children (54%, p <0.01) frames were associated with increased support for enacting ban-the-box policies compared to the control group (42%). There was no effect of the frames on support for removing restrictions to SNAP or public housing. There was no effect of adding the sympathetic narrative across all consequence frames on attitudes or policy support compared to reading only a consequence frame. When we examine the marginal effect of the sympathetic narrative within specific consequence frames, effects were limited.Exposure to a white narrative subject elicited greater perceptions of perceived ability to rehabilitate ( 79% vs. 70%, p 0.04) and support for removing restriction to SNAP (55% vs 43%, p 0.03) compared to exposure to narrative with a black subject.