Effects Of Isolation
Physical Deterioration
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The denial of recreation is far more damaging than it might sound — it compounds the already devastating effects of isolation in very specific ways.
The lack of adequate outdoor recreation time, combined with cells that have small windows inmates can only see out of by rolling up their mattress and standing on it, means that daily exposure to natural light is rare. Every individual on Texas’ death row spends approximately 23 hours a day in complete isolation for the entire duration of their sentence, which on average lasts more than a decade. 
Without movement, muscles weaken, joints stiffen, and the body begins to reflect the confinement of the space it’s trapped in.
Psychological collapse
Research has shown that prolonged periods of extreme isolation cause psychological distress including attention and memory deficits, paranoia, depression, and suicidal thoughts. These effects are especially significant for inmates who already suffer from mental illness — mentally ill prisoners decompensate in isolation, requiring crisis care or psychiatric hospitalization, and many simply will not get better as long as they are isolated. 
Learned Helplessness
Inmates who have been in prison for at least 5 years develop a type of “learned helplessness” — learning that they are helpless in aversive situations, losing control, and giving up trying as a consequence. Learned helplessness is closely connected to depression, loneliness, and physical illness. 
Inmates who have been in prison for at least 5 years develop a type of “learned helplessness” — learning that they are helpless in aversive situations, losing control, and giving up trying as a consequence. Learned helplessness is closely connected to depression, loneliness, and physical illness. 
Recreation — even brief, even solitary — represents the one domain where an inmate can exert will over their body. Without it, that last thread of agency disappears.
The torture comparison
Researchers have found that the clinical effects of extreme isolation can actually be similar to those of physical torture.  One former Texas death row inmate described witnessing men arrive sane and leave the world insane — some spending their last days in complete psychological disintegration.
What recreation actually provides
Research supports the widely held view that outdoor access can be an important determinant of mental health in correctional environments.  Even brief time outside a cell — natural light, open air, physical movement — functions as a psychological reset that prevents total deterioration.