In April 2002, there were three hundred and eighty-six children living in prison with their mothers in South Africa, four of which were inmates of the Pretoria Female Prison. The interaction patterns between these four mothers and their children was investigated by means of individual interviews, observation, field notes and the Marschak Interaction Method. It was found that the mother-child interaction patterns in prison of the participants in this study are typified by four themes: (1) the experience of the restrictiveness of the prison environment; (2) the in-exclusivity of the mother-child attachment process; (3) the mothers' inattention to situations that their children might experience as stressful; and (4) the absence of imaginative play. (Contains 1 table and 3 online resources.)