The results suggest that reduced levels of PA can be added to the growing list of health issues associated with bullying victimization and provide support for the importance of bullying prevention efforts in conjunction with health promotion programs targeted to middle school students.

Experimental research on policing is inspired by the public health analogy of officers as treatment providers. A randomised violence reduction experiment in Philadelphia recently used foot patrols as place-based interventions in violent city spaces during a hot spots policing experiment, and a 23% reduction in violent crime was observed. This paper reports on field observations of foot patrol officers involved in this experiment, which were designed to capture officers' perceptions of, and experiences with the foot patrol function. While the findings resonate with Bittner's depiction of policing on 'skid row', they illuminated the importance of 'territoriality' in a place-based intervention. Officers developed extensive local knowledge of their beat areas, which allowed them to draw from a repertoire of techniques to exert spatial control in the management of disorder. The choice of techniques depended in part on officer style, and the ways in which individual police negotiated the tensions between 'reassurance policing' and the crime fighting demands of 'real police work'. Perhaps most importantly, officers felt constrained by the (artificial) parameters of an experiment that did not allow for the incorporation of local knowledge. This research helps to highlight the value of qualitative research for experimental designs, and reinforces the need to acknowledge and integrate officer knowledge in the design of sustainable interventions.

Using data from the Serious and Violent Offender Reentry Initiative evaluation, this study measures the effects of perceived levels of emotional and instrumental family support on the likelihood of self-reported criminal activity and new arrests in the 15 months following release from state prison. Logistic regression models using both listwise deletion and multiple imputation are employed. Findings indicate that higher levels of emotional support are associated with a significant reduction in reoffending. Higher levels of instrumental support do not significantly predict reoffending. The findings have implications for policies and practices within the corrections system as well as post-release supervision agencies.

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Foot patrol work is rarely described in relation to public health, even though police routinely encounter health risk behaviors and environments. Through a qualitative study of foot patrol policing in violent ‘hotspots’ of Philadelphia, we explore some prospects and challenges associated with bridging security and public health considerations in law enforcement. Noting existing efforts to help advance police officer knowledge of, and attitudes toward health vulnerabilities, we incorporate perspectives from environmental criminology to help advance this bridging agenda. Extending the notion of capable guardianship to understand foot patrol work, we suggest that the way forward for theory, policy and practice is not solely to rely on changing officer culture and behavior, but rather to advance a wider agenda for enhancing collective guardianship, and especially ‘place management’ for harm reduction in the city.