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24 Women & Crim. Just. 1 (2014)

handle is hein.journals/wwcj24 and id is 1 raw text is: Women & CriminalJustice, 24:1-21, 2014 Routledge Copyright 0 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC Group ISSN: 0897-4454 print/1541-0323 online DOI: 10.1080/08974454.2012.733327 Reliability, Validity, and Item Response of the Medical Outcomes Study Social Support Score Among Incarcerated Women SEIJEOUNG KIM and JESSICA MAZZA School of Public Health, Division of Health Policy and Administration, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA Female incarcerations in the United States have increased dramatically in thepast decade. While manyfemale inmates suffer from comorbid substance abuse and mental health issues, theyoften lack social supports and resources that can help female inmates successfully reintegrate back into community. However, the charac- teristics of social support of incarcerated women have not been fully explored. Using the Rasch model, we examined the MOS social support measure in 271 female inmates in a large urban jail. The findings showed that the MOS social support items did not fully capture variability of item response. The Rasch analyses also showed a high ceiling effect, implying that the measure may be less than optimalfor detecting upward change in thispopulation. It is impor- tant to utilize reliable and valid instruments in order to capture attributes in incarcerated individuals as their life experience and context require an additional adjustment to existing instruments. KEYWORDS inmates, item response, Rasch model, social support, women in jail INTRODUCTION The number of incarcerations in the United States has increased dramatically in recent years (Sabol and Couture 2008). More than 2.2 million individuals were held in custody in state or federal prisons or local jails in 2009 (West 2010). The proportion of female inmates accounts for less than 9 percent of the incarcerated population, but the number of female inmates in state Address correspondence to Seijeoung Kim, 1603 W. Taylor St. #781, Chicago, IL 60612, USA. E-mail: skim49@uic.edu