L S Abrams
Biographic Data
| ID | 44259 |
|---|---|
| NAME | L S Abrams |
| GIVEN NAMES | L S |
| FAMILY NAME | Abrams |
| SIGNATURE | ABRAMS L S |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of California, Los Angeles |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-0520-5801 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 74 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 298 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 74 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2000 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 10 |
"I Was Able to Stay Afloat"
Enacting change
Understanding variation in juvenile life without parole legislation following Miller
Research Summary Miller v. Alabama and Montgomery v. Louisiana restricted states’ ability to impose life without parole for youth under age 18 (henceforth JLWOP). Since Miller , 46 pieces of legislation across 34 states and the District of Columbia have altered JLWOP sentencing policies. The current study provides the first comprehensive and scientific review of this legislation. Using policy surveillance as a methodological guide, we found that …
Heterogeneity in family dynamics among adolescents engaging in high-risk sexual behaviors
Background: Little is known about whether and to what extent family factors associated with risky sexual behaviors, such as experiencing commercial sexual exploitation (CSE) or having prior sexually transmitted infections (STIs), differ across risk groups of adolescents. Methods: We conducted secondary analysis of a nationally representative dataset. Latent class analysis was used to assess heterogeneity in family characteristics and childhood ad…
Social work and antisemitism
Social Networks, Substance Use, and Mental Health of Young Adults with Criminal Legal System Involvement
Young Black Changemakers and the Road to Racial Justice
Young Black Changemakers and the Road to Racial Justice tells the stories of how Black youth become changemakers and speaks to researchers, educators, community organizations, and the public. Through many kinds of action, Black youth are driven by a larger purpose to improve the world for Black people. Black families and Black-centered organizations support and sustain Black youth's civic engagement. Investing in community-based organizations ben…
I made the change for me”
Building on the work of Professor Joanna Shapland, this exploratory, phenomenological study theorizes contexts that ground desistance for people sentenced to life in prison for crimes committed as youth. The investigation draws from 28 interviews conducted with 10 formerly incarcerated youth lifers, all male, who were imprisoned for an average of 27 years in California. The major themes are presented along three phases in the desistance journey: …
In the wake of Miller and Montgomery
The movement to end mass incarceration has largely concentrated on people serving shorter sentences for non-violent offenses. There has been less consideration for the 1 in 7 people in prison serving life sentences, overwhelmingly for violent offenses, including those serving juvenile life without parole (JLWOP). Recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions result in a pressing need for data on second chance considerations for JLWOP. This study tracks out…
Exploring Reentry Concerns of Incarcerated Individuals with Severe Mental Illness
Envisioning the future of youth justice
Colorblind Attitudes, Empathy, and Shame
This study examined the relationships between racial knowledge and emotions as predictors of anti-racist behaviors. We analyzed responses of 135 White MSW students from a cross-sectional survey conducted in May 2018. Regression was used to analyze the relationships between colorblind attitudes, empathy, guilt, shame, and anti-racist behaviors. Results indicated that colorblind attitudes and White shame, after controlling for other factors, were c…
“I Wouldn’t Change Who I’ve Become”
Using phenomenological methodology, the authors explore the core emotions involved in the transition from imprisonment to society for released juvenile lifers and how these emotions inform participants’ sense of self. Nine adult men, who had spent an average of 26 years imprisoned for homicide crimes committed as youth, participated in a series of in-depth interviews following their resentencing and release. Using interpretative phenomenological …
A Minimum Age for California's Juvenile Legal System
Through a stakeholder-policymaker-academic partnership, we were able to influence the passage of a minimum age law for the juvenile legal system in California. Lessons learned in this collaboration can be applied by researchers across disciplines who wish to influence policy
We’re not the first and we’re not going to be the last”
This study explores how Black and Latinx young adults (ages 18-25) who were reentering the community from Los Angeles County jails viewed racial injustice in the criminal legal system in the context of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests of summer 2020. A sample of nine young adults participated in a series of up to nine monthly interviews between June 2020 and May 2021. The participants included seven young adults who identified as Black and t…
It’s not ever going to work, so why would I even try?”
Interrogating the carceral state
Youth Justice at a Crossroads
The United States juvenile legal system changed substantially during the twenty-first century. Notable shifts occurred with progressive reform trends aimed to promote developmentally-aligned, trauma-informed, and equitable youth justice systems. Now, in an increasingly complex and polarized landscape, the future of progressive change for youth justice faces a crossroads, with some calling for transformation and others advocating a path of continu…
Social Work Researchers
Previous articleNext article FreeSocial Work Researchers: From Scientific Technicians to ChangemakersJorge Delva and Laura S. AbramsJorge DelvaBoston University Search for more articles by this author and Laura S. AbramsUniversity of California, Los Angeles Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMore…
Some Comments on the Notion of Social Work as a Human Service Cartel
Lost Time
In this phenomenological study, we seek to understand how former juvenile lifers, now middle-aged adults, navigate lost time and life course disruption in the context of family reintegration. Nine men who were incarcerated for an average of 27 years participated in multiple in-depth interviews. Life course theory, social support theory, and ambiguous loss theory are drawn upon to provide insights into their experiences of family reintegration and…
Enforced Separations
During the past two decades, U.S. immigration policies have been tightened resulting in increased deportations of unauthorized persons residing in the United States. This qualitative phenomenological study is theoretically grounded in family systems theory. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with Latinx youth ( n = 8) and their remaining caregivers, specifically mothers ( n = 8) who had recently experienced the deportation of the…
The Criminalization of Young Children and Overrepresentation of Black Youth in the Juvenile Justice System
Racism, Colorblindness, and Social Work Education
Objective: This study provides a nuanced understanding of social work students’ beliefs, emotions, and experiences around race and racism, which is needed to inform the development of antiracist pedagogies. Method: We administered an online surveyed to 532 California MSW students. All students completed a colorblindness scale; students of color completed scales on discrimination and stereotype threat, and white students completed scales on emotio…
I Feel Safe Out Here”
Objective: Community-based youth organizations (CBYOs) serve a variety of roles in urban neighborhoods, and past research has examined the impact of structured youth programs on youth outcomes. However, we rarely hear directly from youth about their perspectives on the CBYOs they frequent. This study aims to understand the perspectives of urban youths of color on CBYOs and why they see CBYOs as important, specifically in a neighborhood affected b…
Voices from the Frontlines
Barriers to Service Use for Postpartum Depression Symptoms Among Low-Income Ethnic Minority Mothers in the United States
The risks of untreated postpartum depression (PPD) in the United States are higher among low-income ethnic minority mothers. However, research has not adequately investigated barriers to formal help seeking for PPD symptoms among this vulnerable population. We used convenience and purposive sampling strategies to recruit mothers experiencing past-year (the year prior to interview) PPD symptoms ( n = 14), community key informants ( n = 11), and se…
Disrupting the Logic of Home-School Relations
Through in-depth interviews with 10 mothers from diverse ethnocultural and socioeconomic groups the authors explore issues of parent roles, access to power, and practices of inclusion and exclusion at an urban elementary school that is undergoing comprehensive school reform. They apply a theory of social and cultural reproduction to assess the potential for school reformstrategies to disrupt traditional patterns of parent marginalization within p…
Guardians of Virtue
Responding to escalating rates of divorce, illegitimacy, and prostitution, the Progressive Era ushered in a wave of cultural anxiety concerning sexual morality. Progressive reformers implemented a variety of state interventions to monitor and correct sexual “misconduct” among working‐class and immigrant young women. This article focuses on the leading social reformers from Chicago's Hull House Settlement and investigates their paradoxical thinkin…
Making Men Into Dads
Recent revisions in child support and paternity establishment legislation enacted under the 1996 welfare reform act, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), significantly alter the American welfare state's relationship to men's fathering. Through a critical review of prior research and social service literature, the authors argue that PRWORA actively constructs fatherhood not only through state policies that …
First-Time Violent Juvenile Offenders
Rising costs, inefficient systems, and high recidivism rates have recently challenged the social and economic value of secure confinement for juvenile offenders; however, current empirical evidence is inconclusive concerning the value of placing violent youth offenders in secure settings to deter them from future involvement in crime. Using propensity score matching and survival analysis, this study examined the risk of recidivism for first-time …
Wayward Girls and Virtuous Women
In the Progressive Era, many immigrant and working-class girls were tried for crimes of immorality, were confined to reformatories, and were sometimes forced to undergo sterilization. This article discusses social workers' relationship to these practices that criminalized adolescent female sexuality by examining two branches of the burgeoning profession: the social reformers and the caseworkers
Youth offender reentry
Between Women
This article discusses a growing body of knowledge concerning the intersections of women’s history and gender history in American social work and related social reform movements. The authors explore current themes and conceptual frameworks that characterize this new scholarship, including professionalism, maternalism, and race relations. They also discuss how this literature challenges traditional interpretations of social work history, suggest t…
Maternal Identity Negotiations Among Low-Income Women With Symptoms of Postpartum Depression
In this study, we used a constructivist grounded theory approach to explore maternal identity negotiations among low-income ethnic minority mothers with postpartum depression (PPD) symptoms. Nineteen mothers were recruited from Women, Infant, and Children clinics located in two coastal cities in the United States to participate in in-depth interviews. Constant comparative analysis revealed that mothers experienced their PPD symptoms and poverty a…
Behavioral health treatment "Buy-in" among adolescent females with histories of commercial sexual exploitation
Mapping a Process of Negotiated Identity Among Incarcerated Male Juvenile Offenders
Building on theories of youth identity transitions, this study maps a process of negotiated identity among incarcerated young men. Data are drawn from ethnographic study of three juvenile correctional institutions and longitudinal semistructured interviews with facility residents. Cross-case analysis of 10 cases that finds youth offenders adapted to the correctional world either with ease or difficulty depending on their professed criminal identi…
Contextual Variations in Young Women's Gender Identity Negotiations
This article explores young women's strategies for seeking personal power and resisting gender-based stereotypes in a wealthy, suburban, White community and a working-class, urban, community of color. Semi-structured interviews with 27 young women were used to examine contextual variations in these gender identity negotiation processes. Both groups of young women were acutely aware of women's subordinate social and cultural position and this awar…
"Rethinking Girls "At-Risk
This conceptual article critically analyzes influential theoretical frameworks concerning adolescent female development, including psychosocial identity stage theory, person-in-environment theory, and feminist psychology. Based on the strengths and limitations of these approaches, the author introduces social workers to an emerging framework that addresses the gender, race, and class intersections that contextualize adolescent girls' developmenta…
They Lay Down the Foundation and Then They Leave Room for Us to Build the House”
Although research has established a high risk of homelessness among young people aging out of foster care, little is known about the experience of these youth who are helped to make the transition to independent living through supportive housing programs. We interview 14 transition-age youth (18 to 24 years) using photo elicitation interviewing to investigate how young people who have aged out of foster care visually and verbally narrate their jo…
Juvenile Justice at a Crossroads
Over a century after its founding, the juvenile justice system sits at an important historical juncture. Mounting concern that the juvenile justice system has strayed from its mission of rehabilitation has catalyzed a vocal campaign for large-scale policy reforms. The current reform movement invokes an abundance of scientific discourses, including neuroscience and evidence-based practice, to situate their arguments for a more humane, cost-effecti…
A Spatial Analysis of Risks and Resources for Reentry Youth in Los Angeles County
Research on youth reentering the community following incarceration has largely focused on individual risks for negative outcomes and in doing so, has overlooked the potential importance of the neighborhood context(s) where youth return. Addressing this research gap, this study explores associations between neighborhood risks and resources and rates of youth reentering the community following incarceration. Examining archival data from 272 zip cod…
Fierce Autonomy
Prior research has examined the high health care needs and vulnerabilities faced by survivors of commercial sexual exploitation (CSE), yet their perspectives are frequently absent. We sought to understand the narratives and views of individuals affected by CSE on their bodies, health, and motivations to seek health care treatment. Twenty-one girls and young women ages 15 to 19 years with self-identified histories of CSE participated in the study.…
And You're Telling Me Not to Stress?” a Grounded Theory Study of Postpartum Depression Symptoms among Low-Income Mothers
Low-income mothers in the U.S. are more likely to experience postpartum depression (PPD) and less likely to seek treatment than their middle-class counterparts. Despite this knowledge, prior research has not provided an in-depth understanding of PPD symptoms as they are experienced by low-income mothers. Through in-depth interviews, this study investigated low-income mothers' ( n = 19) experiences and explanatory frameworks for their PPD symptoms…
Planning for School Change
Contemporary school reform strategies require extensive school-community collaboration, yet the actualization of this goal is very difficult to achieve. Social class and cultural barriers often impede the development of cooperative relationships between school staff, parents, and other community members. In this qualitative study of a planning year for a full-service elementary school, the authors discuss conflicts and tensions that emerged betwe…
Interrogating the carceral state
The Influence of Policy Context on Transition Age Foster Youths' Views of Self-Sufficiency
In this exploratory study, focus group methodology was used to examine the potential influence of policy context on informing transition age youth (TAY) views of self-sufficiency upon aging out of foster care. The authors purposively selected two different policy contexts concerning extended foster care: New York City and Los Angeles County. Compared to New York City, Los Angeles has a relatively newer policy concerning extending the age of foste…
Juvenile justice sentencing
Progressive Maternalists and the Citizenship Status of Low‐Income Single Mothers
Jane Addams, Sophonisba Breckinridge, and Edith Abbott of Chicago’s Hull House are well known for influential social reform and women’s suffrage activities during the Progressive Era. This article investigates how they envisioned citizenship for single mothers receiving mothers’ pensions. The authors argue that these Hull House reformers advocated for women’s full citizenship as workers, yet they positioned low‐income mothers, regardless of work …
Social Work Researchers
Previous articleNext article FreeSocial Work Researchers: From Scientific Technicians to ChangemakersJorge Delva and Laura S. AbramsJorge DelvaBoston University Search for more articles by this author and Laura S. AbramsUniversity of California, Los Angeles Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMore…
Wayward Girls and Virtuous Women
In the Progressive Era, many immigrant and working-class girls were tried for crimes of immorality, were confined to reformatories, and were sometimes forced to undergo sterilization. This article discusses social workers' relationship to these practices that criminalized adolescent female sexuality by examining two branches of the burgeoning profession: the social reformers and the caseworkers
Wayward Girls and Virtuous Women
Planning for School Change
Contemporary school reform strategies require extensive school-community collaboration, yet the actualization of this goal is very difficult to achieve. Social class and cultural barriers often impede the development of cooperative relationships between school staff, parents, and other community members. In this qualitative study of a planning year for a full-service elementary school, the authors discuss conflicts and tensions that emerged betwe…
Guardians of Virtue
Responding to escalating rates of divorce, illegitimacy, and prostitution, the Progressive Era ushered in a wave of cultural anxiety concerning sexual morality. Progressive reformers implemented a variety of state interventions to monitor and correct sexual “misconduct” among working‐class and immigrant young women. This article focuses on the leading social reformers from Chicago's Hull House Settlement and investigates their paradoxical thinkin…
Making Men Into Dads
Recent revisions in child support and paternity establishment legislation enacted under the 1996 welfare reform act, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), significantly alter the American welfare state's relationship to men's fathering. Through a critical review of prior research and social service literature, the authors argue that PRWORA actively constructs fatherhood not only through state policies that …
Challenging Depictions of Dependency
In the debate preceding welfare reform, a consensus emerged that welfare receipt promotes an unacceptable and unhealthy dependence while work in the formal economy leads to a preferable state of independence. Feminist welfare theorists have challenged this equation. This article presents three major findings from focus groups with welfare recipients that demonstrate that recipients are also engaged in challenging popular concepts of welfare depen…
Sociocultural Variations in the Body Image Perceptions of Urban Adolescent Females
Disrupting the Logic of Home-School Relations
Through in-depth interviews with 10 mothers from diverse ethnocultural and socioeconomic groups the authors explore issues of parent roles, access to power, and practices of inclusion and exclusion at an urban elementary school that is undergoing comprehensive school reform. They apply a theory of social and cultural reproduction to assess the potential for school reformstrategies to disrupt traditional patterns of parent marginalization within p…
Disrupting the Logic of Home-School Relations
Through in-depth interviews with 10 mothers from diverse ethnocultural and socioeconomic groups the authors explore issues of parent roles, access to power, and practices of inclusion and exclusion at an urban elementary school that is undergoing comprehensive school reform. They apply a theory of social and cultural reproduction to assess the potential for school reformstrategies to disrupt traditional patterns of parent marginalization within p…
"Rethinking Girls "At-Risk
This conceptual article critically analyzes influential theoretical frameworks concerning adolescent female development, including psychosocial identity stage theory, person-in-environment theory, and feminist psychology. Based on the strengths and limitations of these approaches, the author introduces social workers to an emerging framework that addresses the gender, race, and class intersections that contextualize adolescent girls' developmenta…
Self-Harm Narratives of Urban and Suburban Young Women
This qualitative study explored the motivations, meanings, functions, and consequences of self-harm for young women in urban and suburban contexts. It found that all 6 participants deliberately harmed themselves in response to traumas, family stress, and relationship problems. However, the suburban girls connected their self-harm behaviors to an overall sense of despondency, whereas the urban girls attributed these to release of unresolved anger.…
Contextual Variations in Young Women's Gender Identity Negotiations
This article explores young women's strategies for seeking personal power and resisting gender-based stereotypes in a wealthy, suburban, White community and a working-class, urban, community of color. Semi-structured interviews with 27 young women were used to examine contextual variations in these gender identity negotiation processes. Both groups of young women were acutely aware of women's subordinate social and cultural position and this awar…
Between Women
This article discusses a growing body of knowledge concerning the intersections of women’s history and gender history in American social work and related social reform movements. The authors explore current themes and conceptual frameworks that characterize this new scholarship, including professionalism, maternalism, and race relations. They also discuss how this literature challenges traditional interpretations of social work history, suggest t…
Progressive Maternalists and the Citizenship Status of Low‐Income Single Mothers
Jane Addams, Sophonisba Breckinridge, and Edith Abbott of Chicago’s Hull House are well known for influential social reform and women’s suffrage activities during the Progressive Era. This article investigates how they envisioned citizenship for single mothers receiving mothers’ pensions. The authors argue that these Hull House reformers advocated for women’s full citizenship as workers, yet they positioned low‐income mothers, regardless of work …
Teaching Notes
This article proposes a model of teaching diversity in social work education that includes significant content on White privilege. The authors first discuss some limitations of social work's current multicultural framework. Next, they introduce concepts and pedagogical strategies concerning White identity and privilege that are drawn from multicultural teacher training programs. Based on this literature, the authors argue that teaching about Whit…
Transition services for incarcerated youth
Critical Race Theory and the Cultural Competence Dilemma in Social Work Education
Cultural competence is a fundamental tenet of social work education. Although cultural competence with diverse populations historically referred to individuals and groups from non-White racial origins, the term has evolved to encompass differences pertaining to sexuality, religion, ability, and others. Critics charge that the cultural competence model is largely ineffective and that its tendency to equalize oppressions under a "multicultural umbr…
And You're Telling Me Not to Stress?” a Grounded Theory Study of Postpartum Depression Symptoms among Low-Income Mothers
Low-income mothers in the U.S. are more likely to experience postpartum depression (PPD) and less likely to seek treatment than their middle-class counterparts. Despite this knowledge, prior research has not provided an in-depth understanding of PPD symptoms as they are experienced by low-income mothers. Through in-depth interviews, this study investigated low-income mothers' ( n = 19) experiences and explanatory frameworks for their PPD symptoms…
"And You're Telling Me Not to Stress?" a Grounded Theory Study of Postpartum Depression Symptoms Among Low-Income Mothers
Low-income mothers in the U.S. are more likely to experience postpartum depression (PPD) and less likely to seek treatment than their middle-class counterparts. Despite this knowledge, prior research has not provided an in-depth understanding of PPD symptoms as they are experienced by low-income mothers. Through in-depth interviews, this study investigated low-income mothers' (n = 19) experiences and explanatory frameworks for their PPD symptoms.…
Barriers to Service Use for Postpartum Depression Symptoms Among Low-Income Ethnic Minority Mothers in the United States
The risks of untreated postpartum depression (PPD) in the United States are higher among low-income ethnic minority mothers. However, research has not adequately investigated barriers to formal help seeking for PPD symptoms among this vulnerable population. We used convenience and purposive sampling strategies to recruit mothers experiencing past-year (the year prior to interview) PPD symptoms ( n = 14), community key informants ( n = 11), and se…
Mapping a Process of Negotiated Identity Among Incarcerated Male Juvenile Offenders
Building on theories of youth identity transitions, this study maps a process of negotiated identity among incarcerated young men. Data are drawn from ethnographic study of three juvenile correctional institutions and longitudinal semistructured interviews with facility residents. Cross-case analysis of 10 cases that finds youth offenders adapted to the correctional world either with ease or difficulty depending on their professed criminal identi…
Sampling ‘Hard to Reach’ Populations in Qualitative Research
Sampling is an integral component of all research designs. Several qualitative research texts offer practical guides on how to theorize, recruit, and retain a sample to fulfill the aims of a given study. However, there is far less published discussion among qualitative researchers about sampling ‘hard to reach’ populations such as transient youth and young adults, homeless people, IV drug users, sex workers, and incarcerated, institutionalized, o…
A Spatial Analysis of Risks and Resources for Reentry Youth in Los Angeles County
Research on youth reentering the community following incarceration has largely focused on individual risks for negative outcomes and in doing so, has overlooked the potential importance of the neighborhood context(s) where youth return. Addressing this research gap, this study explores associations between neighborhood risks and resources and rates of youth reentering the community following incarceration. Examining archival data from 272 zip cod…
Youth offender reentry
Maternal Identity Negotiations Among Low-Income Women With Symptoms of Postpartum Depression
In this study, we used a constructivist grounded theory approach to explore maternal identity negotiations among low-income ethnic minority mothers with postpartum depression (PPD) symptoms. Nineteen mothers were recruited from Women, Infant, and Children clinics located in two coastal cities in the United States to participate in in-depth interviews. Constant comparative analysis revealed that mothers experienced their PPD symptoms and poverty a…
Psychology (58 works) · Sociology (50 works) · Political science (45 works) · Criminology (35 works) · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis (30 works) · Developmental psychology (23 works) · Law (21 works) · Social Psychology (21 works) · Homelessness and Social Issues (17 works) · Medicine (17 works)