Officer Race, Role Orientations, and Cynicism toward Citizens

Abstract

Communities are heavily reliant upon officers to help maintain order and reduce fear of crime. Officers, however, may construe their roles narrowly as encompassing only law enforcement. They may also develop cynicism toward citizens. The present study examines officers’ role orientations and cynicism for variations across officer race. Previous research has delved into officer role orientation, but has not systematically tested for racial differences. No empirical evidence exists with respect to race and cynicism. Findings from a roll-call survey of officers in a municipal police department serving a diverse community show moderate racial differences suggesting Latino and black officers adopt a more expansive role orientation than white officers do. Strong effects emerge for cynicism, with black and Latino officers evincing significantly less negativity. These results suggest that diversifying police agencies may benefit communities in need of police help to reduce fear and strengthen informal controls.

Keywords:

• police
• officer race
• perceptions of citizens
• role orientations

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

¹ The order-maintenance role orientation is distinct from order-maintenance policing strategies such as those seen in New York City and other cities which have embarked upon disorder-reduction campaigns largely revolving around the widespread use of pedestrian and vehicle stops (and, sometimes, accompanying frisks). Order-maintenance policing (also known as zero-tolerance or broken-windows policing) has come under fire as racially discriminatory (Gelman, Fagan, & Kiss, 2012) and procedurally unjust (Gau & Brunson, 2010). The order-maintenance role orientation is not an endorsement of aggressive, stop-based tactics; rather, it taps into officers’ beliefs about whether officers should (or should not) get involved in matters involving nuisance offending, disputes, or other matters that pertain more to the public peace than to crime fighting.

² Specifically, the WPBPD employs 221 officers at the patrol rank, 36 sergeants, and 14 lieutenants. In terms of command staff, there were seven captains, two assistant chiefs, and one chief.

³ The number of response items (i.e. four and higher), as well as the decision to include a neutral response, has been the subject of much academic discussion without a definitive resolution (e.g. Allen & Seaman, 2007; Boone & Boone, 2012; Borgers, Hox, & Sikkel, 2004; Cummins & Gullone, 2000; Garland, 1991; Krosnick et al., 2002; Leung, 2011; Raaijmakers, Van Hoof, ‘t Hart, Verbogt, & Vollebergh, 2000). Our choices to include four response categories without a “neutral” option were driven by past empirical police research (e.g. Ingram, Paoline, & Terrill, 2013; Paoline, 2004; Paoline & Terrill, 2014; Terrill & Mastrofski, 2002; Weisburd, Greenspan, Hamilton, Williams, & Bryant, 2000; Worden, 1989), although we acknowledge the validity of other approaches. We thank an anonymous reviewer for this insight.

⁴ The low alpha for the law-enforcement scale is typical of similar scales used in previous research (e.g. Gau et al., 2013; Paoline & Gau, 2016). It could be that more than three items are needed to ensure content validity; Cochran and Bromley’s (2003) 13-item scale had an alpha of .76. The present scale, though, is an improvement over single-item measures seen in much previous work (e.g. Engel & Worden, 2003; Ingram et al., 2013; Paoline, 2004).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jacinta M. Gau

Jacinta M. Gau is an Associate Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Central Florida. Her primary research interests are in policing, with an emphasis on police-community relations, racial issues, and procedural justice and police legitimacy. She has also written about quantitative methods and criminal-justice policy. Her work has appeared in multiple journals. She has published the books Statistics for Criminology and Criminal Justice (Sage Publications; 3rd edition 2017) and Criminal Justice Policy: Origins and Effectiveness (Oxford University Press; forthcoming).

Eugene A. Paoline

Eugene A. Paoline III is a professor and Graduate Director in the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Central Florida. His research interests include police culture, police use of force, and occupational attitudes of criminal justice practitioners. He is the author of Rethinking Police Culture (2001, LFB Scholarly Publishing) and Police Culture: Adapting to the Strains of the Job (2014, Carolina Academic Press), and is currently serving as Co-Principal Investigator on a National Institute of Justice grant geared toward examining the structure, operation, and effectiveness of police Early Intervention (EI) systems.