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.     

On the relationship between cognitive abilities and life-course-persistent offending among a sample of African Americans: A longitudinal test of Moffitt's hypothesis

Prior criminological research showed that cognitive abilities were related to delinquent and criminal activity, primarily within adolescent samples. Moffitt's developmental taxonomy anticipates that cognitive abilities will relate to criminal activity differently throughout the population of offenders, mattering more for life-course-persistent than adolescence-limited offenders. Unfortunately, prior research had not examined in great detail the long-term influence of cognitive abilities on criminal activity from birth to adulthood nor had research explored this issue within an African American sample. In this study, data from the Philadelphia portion of the National Collaborative Perinatal Project (NCPP) were used to examine the long-term effect of cognitive abilities on criminal activity from birth to adulthood.