Correlates of recovery capital among women in jails: Leveraging a dimensional recovery framework

Background: Recovery capital encompasses internal and external factors that support recovery from substance use disorder, such as employment, social support, and physical and mental health. There is a need for more research on recovery capital among women who are incarcerated, who often face complex barriers to recovery, such as poverty, unemployment, and histories of trauma. Methods: Women (N = 900) were recruited from Kentucky jails as part of the broader NIDA-funded Kentucky Justice Community Opioid Innovation Network (JCOIN) cooperative project. Measures from baseline interviews (during incarceration) were selected in alignment with the Substance Abuse Mental Health Service Administration (SAMHSA)’s four dimensions of recovery (‘health’, ‘home’, ‘purpose’ and ‘community’). Bivariate analyses and multilevel mixed-effects generalized linear models (GLMs) were used to determine correlations between selected measures and women’s scores on the Brief Assessment of Recovery Capital (BARC-10). Results: Women reported an average BARC-10 score of 45.4. Several differences were observed in BARC-10 scores across all four recovery dimensions. Items retained in the full multilevel GLM explained 48% of the variance in recovery capital (R² = 0.479), with the ‘community’ dimension representing the strongest relationship (R² = 0.445). Perceived social support was the strongest individual correlate (B = 2.40, p < 0.001) of all variables within the model. Conclusions: This sample of incarcerated women reported low recovery capital. However, findings highlight recovery capital as a multidimensional construct, related to factors across all four SAMSHA dimensions of recovery, especially ‘community’. Interventions are needed to build recovery capital across each dimension, particularly leveraging social support, to promote sustained recovery among women who are incarcerated.