Race, gender, and motivation for becoming a police officer: Implications for building a representative police department

Police departments have come under increasing pressure from community groups, professional organizations, and their constituents to hire more female and minority officers. Although prior research suggested that there might be both gender and racial differences in the factors influencing the decision to enter police work, much of the work was dated and findings were mixed. The current research, conducted in spring 2002, examined motivations for entering police work among a sample of 278 academy recruits in the New York City Police Department (NYPD). Findings indicated that motivations for becoming a police officer were similar regardless of race or gender, and the most influential factors were altruistic and practical, specifically the opportunity to help others, job benefits, and security. Minor differences did emerge among male and female recruits, as well as among Whites, Hispanics, and African Americans, but the practical implications of those differences seemed limited. The article concludes with a discussion of implications for recruitment efforts as police departments seek to draw more diverse applicant pools and build more representative law enforcement agencies.     

Anxiety and cynicism: Companions of the police officer

The work of enforcing the law has inherently aerated anxiety and cynicism among police officers. Through the use of Neiderhoffer’s Police Cynicism Scale and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, the levels of anxiety and cynicism were measured in a random sample of peace officers from the Attanta area. The authors found, through the use of a single-factor analysis of variance, that when anxiety decreased, cynicism decreased. One conclusion, contrary to earlier studies, was that cynicism is higher among new police officers than among veteran officers.     

Demographic and workplace characteristics which add to the prediction of stress and job satisfaction within the police workplace

Much research has been conducted into aspects of the police workplace that contribute to stress for individual officers. The current paper examines the influence of worksplace and job characteristics on both officers' stress and their job satisfaction. Police officers recruited from two divisions of an Australian state police service (n=749) were surveyed. Results show that there was a positive relationship between organizational support and job satisfaction and a negative relationship between organizational support and job stress. Difficulty in dealing with organizational change led to lower job satisfaction and higher levels of job stress. Working long hours led to increased job stress but it did not lead to lower job satisfaction. In contrast, shiftwork led to lowered job satisfaction but it did not lead to job stress. Of particular interest in this study was the finding that the job content factor of dealing with dangerous and unpredictable duties was not predictive of job stress but in fact led to higher job satisfaction. Authors' Note: Jeremy Davey, DipT, Bed, Med, is Deputy Director, Centre for Accident Research and Road Safety, School of Psychology and Counselling, Queensland University of Technology, Beams road, Carseldine, Qld 4034, Australia.     

Race and satisfaction with the police in a small city

In a democratic society, public opinion of criminal justice systems is essential for the proper functioning of police departments. Since the 1970s, police organizations were increasingly concerned with their external social relationship. This was particularly true in the era of community policing. This study explored determinants of satisfaction with the police. Data from 235 residents of a small northeastern city in the United States were analyzed. The results indicated that Hispanics had the lowest global satisfaction with the police, while Caucasians had the highest. The results also revealed the importance of separating global satisfaction from specific satisfaction. The study concluded that police departments must work harder at gaining public satisfaction among African Americans and Hispanics and work toward increasing public feelings of safety in order to improve citizen satisfaction with the police.     

The effect of community policing on fear and crime reduction,police legitimacy and job satisfaction: an empirical review of the evidence

Since the 1970s, community policing strategies or the language thereof have been purportedly initiated by a number of police departments nationwide to address notable issues such as crime, neighborhood disorder, and fear of crime. This policing philosophy has received considerable attention and support among scholars, police administrators, and criminal justice practitioners. This article synthesizes the available empirical evidence on the effectiveness of community policing initiatives using a variety of outcome measures. An overview of community policing is first provided with particular attention paid to its essence and objectives. Prior studies that have analyzed community policing effectiveness are then reviewed and assessed in terms of their methodological rigor and scientific merit. A discussion and future research considerations are presented to conclude.     

Police supervision on the street: An analysis of supervisor/officer interaction during the shift

This article examines a major assumption of street supervisors in police agencies—that control of police officer behavior is dependent on strict hierarchical organization. The intellectual roots of this assumption are examined, and an emerging perspective developed from direct observation of patrol operations is presented. The research questions are addresses with data that were collected from observations of patrol activities in 60 residential neighborhoods in 24 agencies. The analysis, which is referenced to officers' shifts of duty, shows that the effect of supervision is in the direction posited by the authors of traditional police administration texts, but the magnitude of the effect is not overly strong. The findings are used to inform the evaluation of a common policy option directed at improving officer performance through supervision.     

Crime victims and attitudes towards the police: the Israeli case

Crime victims are a critical component of the criminal justice system. Their evaluations of the police have been studied through victimization and public attitude surveys mainly in the US and the UK. This study, which utilizes data from a large scale community survey conducted in Israel in 2008, finds that victims’ attitudes towards the police are significantly more negative than those of non-victims regarding police treatment, performance, and trust in the police. This study is the first to compare the views of victims and non-victims in Israel, while focusing on a wider array of attitudes than previously examined.     

Understanding the public perception and satisfaction of a UK police constabulary

This study explores the public perception of a community in Britain, towards a police constabulary in the UK. The study sought to explore how the levels of satisfaction between Black and Minority Ethnicities (BME) and non BME communities towards this police force in the UK. Using a mixed-methods approach, data was obtained by the use of self-completion questionnaires of 112 participants in an area in the UK and the use of a total of 31 semi-structured interviews. The findings show that participants questioned police competence, the duty of police officers, policing conduct in relation to investigations, experiences of prejudice and expectations communities have of the police. The results for this study showed that there is some support for the idea that the perception of the police during the first contact with a member of the public is likely to be the most powerful predictor of future opinions on the police. This comes from the idea that the public are concerned not only with what the police do in the community, but how they do their work. Finally, as the current study is concerned with policing the local communities, it is important to remember that members of the community will respond positively to being included in police procedure deliberations and audits. The findings suggest that there is still much work to be done by the police service in order to improve the relationship with the communities that they serve. We argue much more emphasis should be placed on community work and increased engagement with younger people in schools and the wider general public.     

Global and specific attitudes toward the police: Disentangling the relationship

Since the 1960s, a substantial body of research has focused on citizens' attitudes toward the police. These studies tap a rather wide variety of outlooks: some ask about specific assessments of the police (e.g., satisfaction with the police in particular incidents), while others ask about more global assessments (e.g., satisfaction with the police in general, police in the community, or police in the neighborhood). Using data obtained through a panel survey of 398 residents of a large midwestern city, we compare specific assessments of police performance with more global attitudes toward the police. We also examine the effects of global and specific attitudes on one another. The results show that the two measures produce similar levels of support for the police. The results reveal further that global attitudes have substantial effects on specific assessments of police performance, and that the effects of specific assessments of police performance on global attitudes are modest by comparison.     

Female officers and the ethic of care: Does officer gender impact police behaviors?

Most of the empirical literature on gender and policing has assessed gender differences in arrest levels and police use of force. While simple gender differences in police behavior are important for understanding skills men and women bring to the policing occupation, research must also determine under what conditions gender differences emerge and what factors impact the relationship between officer gender and behavior for this knowledge to be constructive. Although sexy, arrest and force decisions occur when police discretion is often limited, adding little to the knowledge of how gender affects everyday police-citizen encounters. Using data from systematic social observations of police-citizen encounters in St. Petersburg, Florida and Indianapolis, Indiana, this article replicates past analyses of gender differences in police utilization of controlling and supporting behaviors, but also extends the analyses by assessing the possible impact of intervening situational and organizational characteristics, determining under what conditions female officers utilize different behaviors from their male counterparts. The findings provide mixed support for the general hypothesis of gender-specific responses. Consistent with previous literature, this research suggests that women are much less likely than men to utilize extreme controlling behavior, such as threats, physical restraint, search, and arrest. Surprisingly, the findings do not confirm that women are more likely than men to use supporting behaviors, even when controlling for women's greater likelihood to hold community policing assignments. These findings, while unexpected, are important. Simply assuming female officers manifest stereotypically feminine traits in policing tasks is clearly an overly simplistic conceptualization of the meaning and impact of gender in policing. The implications for female officers, policing, and future research are discussed.     

Cynicism and job satisfaction in policing: Muddying the waters

Since Niederhoffer’s (1969) pioneering work, police cynicism has been a staple in research on police officers and police work, various typologies of police officers and definitions of the police subculture or police personality rely to a greater or lesser degree on conceptions of cynicism and suspicion. More recent research has questioned both the validity of measures of cynicism and typologies of police officers. The present study examines the link between cynicism and job satisfaction which is implicit in the literature. Findings indicate not only that these two factors are correlated, but also that relationships reported between cynicism and other factors in policing are mirrored by correlations between those factors and a measure of job satisfaction. The question which arises is, to what degree are correlations reported in the literature spurious, resulting not from cynicism, as was thought, but from a more generic measure of job satisfaction?     

Race and police officers' perceptions of their job performance: An analysis of the relationship between police officers' race,education level,and job performance

This study examines whether police officers' race is associated with their performance of duties and delivery of services. Using self-report survey methodology, officers of three different races (African-American, White, and Hispanic) evaluated their performance on forty dimensions of their work. The results indicate that race is not a significant factor in officers' self-assessments. However, the results indicated that officers with some college education and college degree (irrespective of the race) report themselves performing better on several dimensions of their work than officers with no college education. Author's Note: Suman Kakar, Ph.D., is Associate Profess or at Florida International University, College of Health and Urban Affairs. University Park Campus, Miami, FL 33199.     

Changing a police culture of corruption: Implications for the police psychologist

The majority of police cadets, upon being sworn in and becoming rookie officers, enter their law enforcement organization and actively seek connections that they hope will be fulfilling and meaningful as well as provide a sense of belonging, security, honesty, mutual understanding, and trust. They strive to be the best that they can be. To the extent that healthy relationships form, the individual officer moves closer towards achieving a sense of wellness and a sense of personal wholeness that typically translates into optimum commitment to and performance on the job. However, to the extent that relationships are embedded in a culture of corruption and meta-pathologies such as dishonesty, an officer's sense of well-being will forever fall short of achieving wholeness and less than optimum performance will be achieved. As the culture continues to become increasingly more toxic, the individual's performance will continue to decline (Trott, 1996, Yerly, 2000). The Mink Group     

Reassessing the impact of race on citizens' attitudes toward the police: A research note

This paper reassesses the relationship between race and attitudes toward the police. Using data obtained through a telephone interview survey of 560 residents of Detroit, the study contradicts previous research by finding that blacks hold more favorable attitudes toward the police than do whites. To explain these findings, we argue that as the social context of cities changes, so might the relationship between race and citizens' attitudes toward the police.     

Opening a window into police internal affairs: Impact of procedural justice reform on third-party attitudes

The study explores the impact of a procedural innovation on justice judgments made by third party observers. The innovation involved the establishment of a review panel with civilian participants to monitor a police department's investigation of allegations of misconduct against its officers. The study distinguishes the impact on racial minority observers from that on racial majority observers. Data suggest that the innovation had a positive, though differing, impact on the justice judgments of both minority and majority observers.     

Juvenile attitudes towards the police: The importance of subcultural involvement and community ties

Citizens' attitudes toward police have been examined in a variety of contexts during the past several decades. Additionally, the importance of juveniles' attitudes towards the police has received considerable attention during the past decade. The current article examines attitudes toward police from a large, multi-site study of sixth to ninth grade youths. Three specific questions were examined: (1) What is the influence of police contact (generally and by different types of contact) on juvenile attitudes toward the police? (2) How does involvement in delinquent subcultures affect these attitudes? (3) How do community contexts and ties influence juvenile attitudes toward the police? Results suggested that community ties and involvement in delinquent subcultures substantially mediate the influence of police contact on juveniles' attitudes toward the police.     

The impact of situational factors, officer characteristics, and neighborhood context on police behavior: A multilevel analysis

While a considerable number of studies had been conducted to examine the effects of various variables on police behavior, very few studies had simultaneously analyzed factors that accounted both for police coercive and noncoercive behaviors. Equally limited is the research on the influences of officer characteristics and neighborhood context on police behavior controlling for all individual situational factors. Using observational and survey data collected by a large-scale project and hierarchical linear modeling techniques, this study assessed the effects of situational, officer, and neighborhood variables on police coercive and noncoercive actions, as well as the cross-level effects between these variables. Findings showed that situational characteristics played a strong role in determining officer coercive behavior, but not noncoercive activities. Similarly, officer-level predictors explained better officers' variation in coercive behavior than noncoercive behavior. Meanwhile, socially disadvantaged neighborhoods were more prone to receive coercive activities than were other neighborhoods. Implications for policy and future research are discussed.