After several years of study of the sociological influences at work in a typical American state penitentiary of about 2,300 inmates it is concluded that" the prisoner's world is an atomized world. Its people are atoms acting in confusion. It is dominated and it submits. Its own community is without a well-established social structure. Recognized values produce a myriad of conflicting attitudes… There is no consensus for a common goal. The inmates' conflict with officialdom and opposition toward society is only slightly greater in degree than conflict and opposition among themselves. Trikery and dishonesty overshadow sympathy and coöperation. Such coöperation as exists is largely symbiotic in nature. Social controls are only partially effective…. Except for the few, there is bewilderment. No one knows, the dogmas and codes notwithstanding, exactly what is important…. While no effort has been made to compare the prison world with a non-penal community, certain broad similarities become evident. In a sense the prison culture reflects the American culture, for it is a culture within it." Prisonization, or the process of taking on in greater or less degree of the folkways, mores, customs, and general culture of the penitentiary, may so disrupt the prisoner's personality that a happy adjustment in any community becomes next to impossible. The methodologies used were case studies, statistical tabulations, autobiographies, and essays written by prisoners upon a variety of suggested topics.(PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved)