Racial/ethnic disparities in prior mental health service use among incarcerated adolescents

Lewis Hyukseung Lee, Sara Goodkind and Jeffrey J. Shook

Children and Youth Services Review, 2017, vol. 78, issue C, 23-31

Abstract: Research on racial and ethnic disparities in mental health and substance abuse service use among incarcerated youth in the U.S. is inconclusive. This cross-sectional study adds to our understanding of racial and ethnic disparities by examining the prior use of mental health and substance abuse services among incarcerated juveniles. Guided by Andersen's behavioral model of health service utilization, a series of logistic regression analyses were conducted on a non-probability sample of 13–19year-old youth in two residential facilities for juvenile offenders in Western Pennsylvania (N=181). Black and Hispanic youth were less likely than White youth to have used mental health and substance abuse services, even when controlling for predisposing, enabling, and need factors. Additional analyses revealed that these differences did not hold across all service types, specifically with regards to outpatient service use. Significant differences did exist, however, in the prior use of inpatient mental health and substance abuse services. This suggests that White youth are often funneled into the mental health system, while youth of color enter the justice system. Implications for racial/ethnic disproportionality in service use and justice system involvement are discussed.

Keywords: Adolescent metal health; Juvenile justice; Mental health service utilization; Racial disparities (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0190740917303468
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:cysrev:v:78:y:2017:i:c:p:23-31

DOI: 10.1016/j.childyouth.2017.04.019

Access Statistics for this article

Children and Youth Services Review is currently edited by Duncan Lindsey

More articles in Children and Youth Services Review from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().