Socially creative activities in Psychologically Informed Planned Environments: engaging and relating in the Offender Personality Disorder Pathway

The Journal of Forensic Practice, Ahead of Print. Purpose Major developments in the management of and intervention for people with significant personality difficulties who have offended are continuing, most recently with the implementation of the Offender Personality Disorder (Department of Health/National Offender Management Service (DoH/NOMS), 2011) Pathway. Included in this, is the Psychologically Informed Planned Environment model, currently being implemented in Prisons and Probation Approved Premises. This model includes the provision of “socially creative activities” (Benefield et al., 2018), opportunities for social learning and relationship building. The purpose of this paper is to explore the rationale for and examples of the implementation of these. Design/methodology/approach The paper offers a narrative review of resear ch around child development, personality, social learning and the policy context around the OPD Pathway. An overview of the socially creative sessions and a rationale for them is provided. Findings A conceptual understanding of the rationale for socially creative sessions is provided with a descri ption of the sessions that focussed upon development of imagination, narrative/story making, social expression and relational experiences, i.e. singing, drama and reading with others. It is argued that the activities offered opportunities to engage in a different medium for expression, learning and relating, that may provide a catalyst for change i...
Source: Journal of Forensic Practice - Category: Forensic Medicine Source Type: research