Effect of Viewing Emotionally Laden Paintings on Attitudes of Male Sex Offenders

Abstract

Creative arts are overly caricatured as non-essentially flossy and unmerited luxury particularly when executed in a jail setting. However, research suggests that art-based prison programs can significantly bear upon the lives of offenders. In this paper the authors make reference to this connotation in order to investigate the potential for an art-based prison program involving repeated viewing of emotionally laden paintings to influence attitudes towards crime among male sex offenders. Towards this goal the authors used a one group pretest-posttest quasi experimental design to assess the participants’ general attitudes to offending (G scale), anticipation of re-offending (A scale), victim hurt denial(V scale) and evaluation of crime as worthwhile(E scale). Rape and defilement convicts aged 18-45 years from Nairobi West Prison participated in sessions that were facilitated three times a week during the 5 week program. A paired T- Test showed statistically significant improvements between post-test1 and pre-test (t=-3.117, p-value=0.003) and between post-test2 and pre-test (t=-2.161, p-value=0.035). Positive results were found for three attitude measures; G scale, A-scale and E-scale. The findings suggest that participation in art prison programs involving repeated viewing of emotive artwork can be an effective intervention resulting in attitude change among male sex offenders.