Re-analyzing the results of a community policing study leads to a more positive conclusion about its effects

[Pelican Press 0]

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

Re-analyzing the results of a community policing study leads to a more positive conclusion about its effects

data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///ywAAAAAAQABAAACAUwAOw==

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

In the last 30 years, community-oriented policing has been a key innovation in policing. But while this proactive approach boosts citizens’ evaluations of police, evidence is sparse that it reduces ******.

In a new study, researchers suggest that this conclusion is likely flawed because of ****** reporting sensitivity (CRS) bias. Re-analyzing the results of a prior study, researchers reached a very different, more positive conclusion about community policing, suggesting that future research should consider CRS bias.

The study, by researchers at George Mason University (GMU) and Hebrew University of Jerusalem, is

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

in the Journal of Law and Empirical Analysis.

“Reviews of community-oriented policing have had a major impact on how we view the ****** prevention benefits of such programs, leading to an assumption that community policing does not reduce ******,” says David Weisburd, professor of criminology, law, and society at GMU and emeritus professor of law and ********* justice at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, who led the study. Weisburd is an expert whose work is promoted by the NCJA ****** and Justice Research Alliance.

CRS bias occurs because community policing leads to more cooperation with and trust in the police and subsequently increased ****** reporting. Such increased ****** reporting bias adjusts ****** prevention outcomes of community policing downward.

In this study, researchers illustrated this process by reanalyzing data from the Brooklyn Park ACT Experiment, a randomized controlled trial of efforts to boost police-community collaboration in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota. The study, conducted in 2015 and 2016, suggested that the positive effects of community policing on community members’ perceptions of the police may lead to what the authors defined as ****** reporting inflation, meaning that community members are more likely to report problems in their neighborhoods to the police.

In their re-analysis of the earlier study, the authors identified disorder ******* and domestic ******* as the underlying mechanisms that contributed to its findings. This led them to redefine ****** reporting inflation as CRS because the data suggested a greater willingness to report ****** to the police rather than changes in ****** per se.

Citizens were more likely to report disorder ******* because of the increased community collaboration and trust built in community policing programs. In this case, ******* that were less serious and less likely to be reported before the experiment were reported more often during the experiment.

In turn, the more serious category of domestic *******, which are generally underreported, were also more likely to be reported during the experiment because of increased collaboration and trust. This increased sensitivity in reporting led to a rise in recorded ****** incidents not only in these categories of ******, but also in other categories like ********* and property *******.

In testing this more general mechanism, both in terms of increased sensitivity for ****** calls to the police more generally and for disorder ******* specifically, the study found strong evidence of CRS bias in these data. Based on their findings, the authors concluded that adjusted estimates tell a very different, more positive, story about community policing. Simply stated, when previous studies are adjusted for CRS, community policing leads to significant reductions in ******.

The study highlights a contradiction between the goals of community policing and the measurement of its ****** prevention impacts. Increasing collaboration and reporting to the police leads to more ****** calls to the police—a measure sometimes used to evaluate policing interventions. Increased calls to the police, in turn, lead to higher numbers of ****** incidents, which are commonly used as indicators of real ****** levels in evaluations of policing programs.

The authors recommend a way to correct ****** outcomes reported by previous studies and illustrate how using this method may affect interpretations of the overall impacts of community policing on ******. They also recommend that future research on this topic recognize and adjust for CRS bias or identify other measures not influenced by this mechanism.

Of the study’s limitations, the authors note that Brooklyn Park may not be representative of community policing studies more generally.

“Our results suggest that it is time to look critically at the conclusions of previous research on community policing,” notes David B. Wilson, professor of criminology, law, and society at GMU, who coauthored the study.

“Adjusting for CRS bias dramatically shifts the size and statistical significance of ****** outcomes in other studies, calling into question the prevailing scientific conclusion that community policing does not affect ******.”

More information:
David Weisburd et al, Are We Underestimating the ****** Prevention Outcomes of Community Policing? The Importance of ****** Reporting Sensitivity Bias, Journal of Law and Empirical Analysis (2024).

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

Provided by
****** and Justice Research Alliance

Citation:
Re-analyzing the results of a community policing study leads to a more positive conclusion about its effects (2024, July 31)
retrieved 31 July 2024
from

This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no
part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

#Reanalyzing #results #community #policing #study #leads #positive #conclusion #effects

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

This is the hidden content, please

• Sign In
• or
• Sign Up

For verified travel tips and real support, visit: https://hopzone.eu/