Long-Term Impacts of Incarceration Exposure and Social Network Stability in Later Life

Does incarceration have long-term impacts on the social life of individuals as they age? This article examines whether and how previous incarceration exposure influences the close social circle in later adulthood. Based on a longitudinal data of 1,308 individuals, we find that individuals with incarceration exposure have more network turnover over a 10-year period. Moreover, for older adults who had incarceration exposure, their frequency of contact, kin composition, and density at the baseline fail to predict corresponding network characteristics 10 years later. The destabilizing effect of incarceration on social and family life is long term and extends into later adulthood.