The foundations of defiance: examining the psychological underpinnings of ethnic minority defiance toward police

Figures & data

Figure 1. Integrated theoretical model.

Table 1. Factor analyses.

	Factor
	1	2	3	4	5	6
Moral-democratic threat
Police are disrespectful of people like you		.704
Police are disinterested in what people like you have to say about local issues		.652
Police are suspicious of people like you		.848
Police view people like you as a threat to community safety		.872
Police often make negative judgements about people like you		.807
Police view people like you as criminals		.900
Status threat
Police view people like you as important (r)			.890
Police view people like you as worthy members of Australian society (r)			.884
Police respect what people like you contribute to Australia (r)			.813
Police legitimacy
My own feelings about what is right and wrong generally align with how the police act in my community				.598
The police share the same values as people like me				.407
My own feelings about what is right and wrong usually agree with police rules and policies				.705
I feel a moral obligation to obey police				.885
Overall, I obey police with good will				.813
Obeying police ultimately advantages everyone				.776
Resistance
It is important not to let police push you around					.803
As a society we need more people willing to take a stand against rude police					.905
It is important that people lodge a formal complaint against disrespectful police behaviour					.792
Disengagement
I try to avoid contact with police at all costs						.837
Even if I needed help from police, I would prefer to avoid making contact with them						.865
Procedural injustice
Police are approachable and friendly (r)	.655
Police treat people fairly (r)	.784
Police treat people with dignity and respect (r)	.838
Police let people speak before they make a decision (r)	.836
Police care about people (r)	.788
Police are polite to people (r)	.832
Police make their decisions based upon facts, not their personal opinions (r)	.862
Police give people a chance to express their views before making decisions (r)	.839
Police take into account the needs and concerns of the people they deal with (r)	.804
Eigenvalues	9.860	2.976	2.630	2.034	1.349	1.151
Proportion of variance explained	.340	.103	.091	.070	.047	.040

Note: Extraction method: Factor analysis with promax rotation. Only factor loadings >0.30 are displayed. Procedural injustice items were reverse coded as indicated by (r) such that lower scores on these items indicated more procedural justice and higher scores indicated less procedural justice (or more procedural injustice).

Figure 2. Path analysis with unstandardised estimates and bootstrapped standard errors.

Note: N = 790; Error covariance of resistance and disengagement and of status and moral-democratic identity threats are not depicted. Non-significant paths tested in the final model are represented by broken lines. Ethnic group (1 = Middle Eastern Muslim, 0 = Vietnamese); Gender (1 = female, 0 = male); Police contact (1 = police contact in past 2 years, 0 = no police contact). Coefficients calculated with bootstrapped standard errors (1000 replications). Significance levels shown here are for the unstandardised solution ***p ≤ .001; **p ≤ .01; *p ≤ .05. Coefficients are rounded to 2 decimal places.

Table 2. Pearson’s correlation coefficients.

	1.	2.	3.	4.	5.
1. Disengagement	1
2. Resistance	.212***	1
3. Procedural injustice	.279***	.242***	1
4. Legitimacy	−.153***	-.019	−.441***	1
5. Moral-democratic threat	.226***	−.009	.449***	−.238***	1
6. Status threat	.051	.067	.478***	−.154***	.404***

Note: Significance level ***p ≤ .001;**p ≤ .01; *p ≤ .05.

Table 3. Goodness-of-fit statistics.

Statistic	Value
Chi Square (13)	27.656, p = .035
RMSEA	.030
CFI	.988
TLI	.970
SRMR	.022

Table 4. Path analysis direct, indirect and total effects, unstandardised coefficients.

	Direct		Indirect		Total
Procedural injustice
Ethnic group → procedural injustice	.219	**	–		.219	**
Gender → procedural injustice	−.209	**	–		−.209	**
Police contact → procedural injustice	.173	*	–		.173	*
Status threat
Procedural injustice → status threat	.462	***			.462	***
Ethnic group → status threat	.250	***	.101	**	.351	***
Gender → status threat	–		−.096	**	−.096	**
Police contact → status threat	–		.080	*	.080	*
Moral-democratic threat
Procedural injustice → moral-democratic threat	.414	***			.414	***
Ethnic group → moral-democratic threat	.561	***	.091	**	.651	***
Gender → moral-democratic threat			−.086	**	−.086	**
Police contact → moral-democratic threat			.072	*	.072	*
Disengagement
Procedural injustice → disengagement	.275	***	−.006		.269	***
Status identity threat → disengagement	−.154	***	.001		−.153	***
Moral-democratic threat → disengagement	.162	***	-.000		.161	***
Legitimacy → disengagement	.005		-		.005
Ethnic group → disengagement	–		.111	**	.111	**
Gender → disengagement	–		−.056	**	−.056	**
Police contact → disengagement	–		.046	*	.046	*
Age → disengagement	−.012	***	.000		−.012	***
Resistance
Procedural injustice → resistance	.373	***	−.132	***	.240	***
Status threat → resistance	−.047		.012		−.035
Moral-democratic threat → resistance	−.130	**	−.009		−.140	**
Legitimacy → resistance	.130	**	–		.130	**
Ethnic group → resistance	–		−.035		−.035
Gender → resistance	–		−.050	**	−.050	**
Police contact → resistance	–		.042	*	.042	*
Age → resistance	−.012	***	.001	*	−.011	***
Legitimacy
Procedural injustice → legitimacy	−.449	***	.015		−.434	***
Status threat → legitimacy	.096	*	–		.096	*
Moral-democratic threat → legitimacy	−.072		–		−.072
Ethnic group → legitimacy	–		−.111	**	−.111	**
Gender → legitimacy	–		.091	**	.091	**
Police contact → legitimacy	–		−.075	*	−.075	*
Age → legitimacy	.009	***	−		.009	***

Note: N = 790. Ethnic group (1 = Middle Eastern Muslim, 0 = Vietnamese); Gender (1 = female, 0 = male). Police contact (1 = police contact in past 2 years, 0 = no police contact). Coefficients calculated with bootstrapped standard errors (1000 replications). Significance levels are ***p ≤ .001; **p ≤ .01; *p ≤ .05. Coefficients are rounded to 3 decimal places.

Table 5. Partitioning indirect effects for key pathways, unstandardised coefficients.

	b(se)
Indirect effects of procedural injustice on resistance
Status threat	−.022(.026)
Moral-democratic threat	−.054(.021)	*
Legitimacy	−.058(.020)	*
Indirect effects of procedural injustice on disengagement
Status threat	−.071(.023)	*
Moral-democratic threat	.067(.019)	***
Legitimacy	−.002(.017)

Note: Significance levels are ***p ≤ .001; **p ≤ .01; *p ≤ .05. Coefficients are rounded to 3 decimal places.