Wednesday, June 17, 2009 This was not such a bad thing for
people being released from prison, says David Kirk, an assistant
professor of sociology at The University of Texas at Austin. In
fact, Kirk’s recent research, published in the June issue of
American Sociological Review, indicates that those not returning
to the old neighborhood had a better chance of staying out of
prison than those who went back to their pre-prison places and
patterns. “Ex-prisoners often fall into the same habits and
routines that got them into trouble in the first place,” Kirk
said. “The destruction from Katrina forced some ex-prisoners to
sever peer ties and to establish new routine activities. My
study concludes that doing so is important for reducing the
likelihood of recidivism.” The natural disaster of the hurricane
presented the opportunity for a natural experiment, one in which
the world offers a situation that could not be set up in a
laboratory. The study included two pre-Katrina groups consisting
of 1,538 and 1,731 parole