UC Irvine

With the expansive criminal justice system reaching over 70 million people, the oft-researched collateral consequences of system contact robustly demonstrate uneven outcomes for impacted persons in education, housing, health, income attainment and civic involvement among other things. A voluminous body of literature has shown that criminal justice involvement can lead to stigmatization in an array of institutional arenas anchoring social life. Recently, research has focused on how stigma operates in romantic relationships, but less so with a specific focus on criminal justice involved persons seeking casual sexual dating encounters and committed cohabitating relationships. Using original survey data and qualitative focus groups and in-depth interviews, this dissertation advances our understanding of the collateral consequences of system contact by focusing analytic attention on: 1) how criminal stigma impacts daters’ decision-making about prospects for dating, sexual engagement, cohabitating, and the like; 2) violence as a signifier that is arguably amplified for daters who are making decisions about dating prospects, and 3) what matters to daters and how, within a larger set of concerns, criminal histories matter (or not). Daters’ decision-making reveals patterns of inconsistency in concern about the presence of a history of criminal legal system contact when considering committed cohabitation. Specifically, older, minority, and parent daters are less likely to exhibit inconsistent reactions towards prospects with criminal system contact. A criminal history that contains violence evokes concern and acts as a deterrent to considerations of more serious commitments, such as cohabitation; however, it is not a universal mark of stigma when it comes to causal encounters. Finally, as data from focus groups and interviews lay bare, for some daters criminal justice contact is an everyday, normal experience while for others, such contact is extraordinary; these and other differences are moderated by race. Related, some daters look for stability in relationships and may be deterred by violent histories that can inject chaos and precarity into their lives. As parents, daters’ perspectives may shift when a partner with criminal legal system contact are perceived to be a role model for their children and can provide financial support. Other daters express concerns about recidivism and fears surrounding taking personal responsibility for ensuring their partner refrains from future criminal behavior. Finally, many daters opt to extend grace and redemption to individuals who have criminal histories, but that extension stops short of viewing them as suitable partners for more serious relationships such as cohabitation. These and other findings reported in this dissertation extend understandings of the collateral consequences of criminal justice contact, where operations of criminal stigma can influence who is able to attain romantic connection and on what terms, and suggests that romantic relationships and criminal stigma warrant further attention and research.