The purpose of this research is to examine how adolescent law violators respond to court-ordered institutionalization in a locked psychiatric hospital. In particular, the focus will be upon determining the effects of institutionalization on adolescents' self-concept and the roles they adopt in the hospital in relation to their peers and to the hospital staff. This determination will be made on the basis of observances made of the target group at Crossroads Hospital, a locked, psychiatric facility located in the San Fernando Valley. Observances will be supplemented with existing studies of the target group and their reaction(s) to the hospital setting.
So that the reported observances may be placed in context, this paper presents relevant information in two discrete categories. These categories are: (1) Information about the Crossroads Hospital facility and the researcher/observer's job position at this facility; (2) Information taken from the existing literature on the responses of adolescent law violators remanded by the Courts to locked psychiatric facilities coupled with a discussion of the researcher's specific observances of the target group while working at the Crossroads Hospital Facility.
Crossroads Hospital is the only full-service psychiatric and chemical dependency treatment facility in the Los Angeles area that is exclusively devoted to adolescent care. The facility lists its overall treatment objectives in its promotional literature as:
... an intensive program...which is designed to help adolescents acquire skills in such areas as personal growth, interpersonal relationships, vocational fulfillment and social values.
Treatment begins with a comprehensive psychiatric evaluation in which patients are given a thorough medical exam, psychological test batteries, and are interviewed for the purposes of compiling extensive personal, social, and family histories. When this evaluation is completed, patients part...