Patrol officers and public reassurance: a comparative evaluation of police officers, PCSOs, ACSOs and private security guards

Abstract

The objective of this study is to establish how well the public distinguishes between different uniformed patrol officer patrolling shopping malls, and whether they have different effects on feelings of safety and worry about crime. It is based on interviews with a sample of 502 shoppers at five shopping malls in Southern England. Using photographs, most respondents correctly identified the police officer and the PCSO, whereas fewer recognised the ACSO and private security guard, and few the ACSO. Police officers instilled the greatest feelings of safety, well above PCSOs, who, in turn, were rated above security guards and ACSOs. Police officers also generated the most worries, especially among young women. Police officers emit ‘control signals’ that have stronger positive effects on reassurance, reflecting correct identification combined with established regard and confidence. Patrol officers who were not police officer provided weaker ‘control signals’. Correct identification made less difference to reassurance they provided, especially for security guards. Police officers appear to be as cost-effective as PCSOs, though far less so than private security officers. Successful ‘reassurance policing’ depends on who carries out the policing as well as what is policed.

Keywords:

• patrol officer
• reassurance
• control signals
• cost-effectiveness

Notes

1. Surveys were organised and implemented by the first author and fuller findings are included in Rowland, 2011.

2. ‘don't know’ responses are excluded.

3. Although safety and worry perceptions are correlated for all four types of patrol officer (p<.001 for all 4 officer types), the effect size is small (Kb<.19 for all 4 officer types). The degree of co-association is also low (Nagelkerke R ²<.09), indicating co-variance of between 5 and 10% between safety and worry, so that safety and worry may be taken to measure different aspects of reassurance. It, therefore, seems reasonable to sum their net effects into a single measure.