Feeling Blue: Police Perceptions of Public Antipathy and Police Culture

• In Event: Policing in the Post-Ferguson Era

Abstract

Recent police protests have spurred claims by both practitioners and academics that public antipathy for the police may influence police occupational norms. Using a sample of 12,376 sworn law enforcement officers who participated in the National Police Research Platform and a series of ordinary least squares regressions, this study examines whether officers’ perceptions of public support predict their cultural orientations. Results reveal that officers perceiving greater public antipathy report more social isolation, work-group solidarity, cynicism toward the public, and coercive attitudes. We connect these findings to theoretical arguments of early police ethnographers and contemporary claims of the “Ferguson Effect.”  

Authors

• Christopher J. Marier, University of South Florida

• Richard Moule, University of South Florida