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Humans peeing: Justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces

Justice-involved women face myriad challenges as they negotiate the terms of community supervision and manage the long-term implications and stigma of living with a criminal record. Major tasks that women juggle include securing safe, affordable housing, finding and retaining employment, accessing p...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Smoyer, Amy B., Pittman, Adam, Borzillo, Peter
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10004595/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36897925
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0282917
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author Smoyer, Amy B.
Pittman, Adam
Borzillo, Peter
author_facet Smoyer, Amy B.
Pittman, Adam
Borzillo, Peter
author_sort Smoyer, Amy B.
collection PubMed
description Justice-involved women face myriad challenges as they negotiate the terms of community supervision and manage the long-term implications and stigma of living with a criminal record. Major tasks that women juggle include securing safe, affordable housing, finding and retaining employment, accessing physical and mental health care (including substance use treatment), and handling relationships with family, friends, children, and intimate partners. In addition to these responsibilities, women must meet their basic physiological needs to eat, sleep, and use the toilet. Women’s ability to safely meet their personal care needs may impact their capacity to manage their criminal-legal challenges. This study uses qualitative methods to understand justice-involved women’s lived experiences related to urination. Specifically, the study reports on a thematic analysis of 8 focus groups conducted with justice-involved women (n = 58) and the results of a toilet audit conducted in the downtown areas of the small city in the United States where the focus group participants were living. Findings suggest that women had limited access to restrooms and reported urinating outside. Lack of restroom access impacted their engagement with social services support and employment and their ability to travel through public spaces. Women perceived their public toilet options as unsafe, increasing their sense of vulnerability and reinforcing the idea that they did not have full access to citizenship in the community because of their criminal-legal involvement. The exclusion and denial of women’s humanity that is perpetuated by a lack of public toilet access impacts women’s psychosocial outcomes. City governments, social service agencies, and employers are encouraged to consider how lack of toilet access may impact their public safety and criminal-legal objectives and expand opportunities for people to access safe restroom facilities.
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spelling pubmed-100045952023-03-11 Humans peeing: Justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces Smoyer, Amy B. Pittman, Adam Borzillo, Peter PLoS One Research Article Justice-involved women face myriad challenges as they negotiate the terms of community supervision and manage the long-term implications and stigma of living with a criminal record. Major tasks that women juggle include securing safe, affordable housing, finding and retaining employment, accessing physical and mental health care (including substance use treatment), and handling relationships with family, friends, children, and intimate partners. In addition to these responsibilities, women must meet their basic physiological needs to eat, sleep, and use the toilet. Women’s ability to safely meet their personal care needs may impact their capacity to manage their criminal-legal challenges. This study uses qualitative methods to understand justice-involved women’s lived experiences related to urination. Specifically, the study reports on a thematic analysis of 8 focus groups conducted with justice-involved women (n = 58) and the results of a toilet audit conducted in the downtown areas of the small city in the United States where the focus group participants were living. Findings suggest that women had limited access to restrooms and reported urinating outside. Lack of restroom access impacted their engagement with social services support and employment and their ability to travel through public spaces. Women perceived their public toilet options as unsafe, increasing their sense of vulnerability and reinforcing the idea that they did not have full access to citizenship in the community because of their criminal-legal involvement. The exclusion and denial of women’s humanity that is perpetuated by a lack of public toilet access impacts women’s psychosocial outcomes. City governments, social service agencies, and employers are encouraged to consider how lack of toilet access may impact their public safety and criminal-legal objectives and expand opportunities for people to access safe restroom facilities. Public Library of Science 2023-03-10 /pmc/articles/PMC10004595/ /pubmed/36897925 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0282917 Text en © 2023 Smoyer et al https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Smoyer, Amy B.
Pittman, Adam
Borzillo, Peter
Humans peeing: Justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces
title Humans peeing: Justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces
title_full Humans peeing: Justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces
title_fullStr Humans peeing: Justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces
title_full_unstemmed Humans peeing: Justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces
title_short Humans peeing: Justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces
title_sort humans peeing: justice-involved women’s access to toilets in public spaces
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10004595/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36897925
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0282917
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