“We Are More than Crime fighter:” Social Media Images of Police Departments

• In Event: New Technology in Policing

Abstract

According to a recent survey conducted by the IACP Center for Social Media (2015), currently about 96% of U.S. police departments have adopted social media, nearly 94% of which have implemented Facebook. Unfortunately, researchers have not paid much attention to police use of social media. The existing research in this area (e.g., Crump, 2011; Heverin & Zach, 2010; Lieberman et al., 2013; Procter et al., 2013) is decidedly more descriptive than analytical. The study serving as the basis for this paper entails a careful study of 14 of the most popular police Facebook pages, and analyzes posts during a one-year period. The study documents 5 major themes and 24 subthemes in these posts, then applies a two-step cluster analysis to identify 4 principal types of police Facebook images: crime fighter, traditional cop, public-relation facilitator, and balancer. The theory of diffusion of innovations (Rogers, 2003) is employed to provide justification for the timeliness of the study, and to demonstrate how the four Facebook images can be used to gain insight into police use of social media. Public policy implications are discussed along with implications for further research.

Authors

• Xiaochen Hu, Fayetteville State University

• Kourtnie Rodgers, Michigan State University

• Nicholas P. Lovrich, Washington State University