Encounters Between Police Officers and Youths: The Social Costs of Disrespect

Abstract

The present study focused on firsthand and vicarious encounters between youths and police officers and the relationship between perceived police behaviors on youths ' attitudes toward the police and youths ' feelings of safety in their neighborhoods. Self-report surveys were administered to public high school students in a large urban area (Chicago). A total of 891 respondents completed the surveys and answered questions about their own encounters with the police and their observations of other youths' encounters with the police. Students who claimed that ofticers had disrespected them or other youths were less likely to trust and respect the police or to think that oficers are fair or care about the community, compared with students who claimed that oficers had respected them or other youths. Downloaded by [UZH Hauptbibliothek / Zentralbibliothek Zürich] at 11:56 26 December 2014

Exploring the dimensions of trust in the police among Chicago juveniles

“…Friedman et al (2004) found that Chicago high school students who reported being gang members were more likely to be stopped and disrespected by the police than students who reported that they were not gang members. Approximately 75 percent of the students who claimed to be a gang member stated that they felt disrespected by the police, compared to 58 percent of those who claimed that they were not a gang member.…”

“…Both questions asked participants to respond using a Likert scale ranging from strongly agree to strongly disagree. Attitudes toward each parent were measured separately because a large percentage of students reported that they resided in a single-parent household (see Friedman et al, 2004). Higher values on either variable indicated that the student identified more strongly with the respective parent, whereas lower values indicated that the student identified less strongly.…”

“…The data used in this research were part of a larger study of policeyouth relations (see Friedman et al, 2004). Questionnaire data for this study were obtained from a purposive sample of Chicago public school students who were enrolled in May 2000 in eighteen high schools throughout the city.…”

“…By early adulthood, most people's views of the police are fairly well developed, including their perceptions of officers' trustworthiness (Friedman et al, 2004). Despite the early formulation of attitudes toward the police and the centrality of trust in effective police programming, many questions are unanswered about youngsters' trust in the police and the association between trust and other views and experiences of adolescents.…”

“…Numerous studies had demonstrated that the relationship between police officers and youths is highly strained and antagonistic (Friedman, Lurigio, Greenleaf, & Albertson, 2004). Police-youth relationships appear to be quite volatile in urban areas with large minority populations (Browning, Cullen, Cao, Kopache, & Stevenson, 1994;Friedman et al, 2004;Janeksela, 1999;Jones-Brown, 2000;Taylor, Turner, Esbensen, & Winfree, 2001;Weitzer & Tuch, 2005). Juveniles' negative attitudes toward the police increase the tension between the two groups, leading inexorably to confrontational encounters (Bittner, 1990;Herz, 2002).…”