AI-assisted Qualitative Analysis: Criminal Justice Help-Seeking

Direct answer: According to PLOS One, help-seeking for mental health and substance use among people with community criminal justice contact is shaped by three interlocking domains (desire, ability, and context) and those domains are strongly influenced by social networks and local culture.

• Connell et al., PLOS One (published 30 July 2026) interviewed 50 people between 1 November 2023 and 31 July 2024 (23 in LA1, 27 in LA2) and derived a framework of 'desire', 'ability', and 'help-seeking context'.
• Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) note population prevalence estimates cited in their introduction commonly report over 40% meeting criteria for a substance use disorder, more than 10% for major depressive or psychotic disorders, and about 75% for any personality disorder in similar justice-involved groups.
• Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) report that most participants had at least one unsuccessful help-seeking attempt and that relational influences across networks often normalized problems or discouraged help-seeking.

Answer-first: Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) collected qualitative interviews from 50 adults with recent criminal justice contact and used framework analysis to show help-seeking results from interactions between desire, ability, and context, with strong relational influences.

Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) explain that interviews were audio-recorded and conducted using Network Canvas software, and that data collection ran from 1 November 2023 to 31 July 2024.

Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) report 50 participants were interviewed (23 in LA1, 27 in LA2) and that interviews lasted up to two hours, producing pseudonymised transcripts and linked social network maps used in framework analysis.

Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) conclude that help-seeking is rarely purely individual: participants described network norms that normalized substance use, epistemic mistrust toward services, and local stigma that made seeking help risky.

Direct participant evidence: participant P13 in Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) said, "you just kind of can’t get away from the social, " and participant P12 said, "I have dealt with it for almost twenty odd years by myself… I don’t like going to doctors because I think they are a waste of time...."

Answer-first: Researchers and program teams should treat help-seeking as a multi-level, network-shaped outcome and design qualitative studies and interventions that capture relational data, as Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) demonstrate.

Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) show that social network structure, shared norms, and local service availability meaningfully alter whether participants desire or are able to seek help, so mixed-methods designs that combine interview transcripts and network data produce richer, actionable findings.

Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) recommend multi-level interventions that go beyond individual-focused approaches; program teams should therefore prioritize community-level trust-building, peer-credible messaging, and service navigation supports that accommodate unstable housing, variable schedules, and mistrust.

Recap: Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) demonstrate that help-seeking among people with community criminal justice contact is shaped by desire, ability, and context, and that relational network influences are central.

Actionable next step: Qualitative teams can combine interview transcripts and participant-aided sociograms and accelerate framework-driven analysis using AI-enabled tools to produce validated thematic matrices and targeted recommendations for services.

Learn more and experiment: if your team wants to reanalyze interview-plus-network datasets like Connell et al., PLOS One (2026), Try Evidano for free to test fast transcription, thematic extraction, and cross-segment visualizations.

Ethics note: Reanalysis of justice-involved data should follow the consent and access controls described by Connell et al., PLOS One (2026) and use secure platforms.