Law Enforcement Agencies Communication on Social Media – Polish Police Content Study

• In Event: Lightning Talk: Policing: Theory, Diversity, Enforcement, & Partnerships

Abstract

Objectives: The project Social media in Law Enforcement Agencies practice included a study of content posted by Regional Police Departments on its Facebook profiles. The aim was to analyze and describe the content published in order to find if there were any rules or guidelines applied by respective Regional Police Department admins.

Data: Facebook Insights Data about almost 14 thousand posts published between 10 March 2018 and 25 January 2020 was provided by Regional Police Departments fan pages administrators. The data included details such as post total reach and number of users engaged. Each post was labeled into 1 of 29 categories.

Results: Videos had the best chance to become virals - they generated the greatest reach and users’ engagement. The most published content included posts labeled as crime-related: solved cases and non-crime-related tips.

Key message: The effectiveness in reaching the audience by Police on social media could depend on the admins’ social media skills as well as topics selected to be posted.

Authors

• Błażej Stromczyński, University of Warsaw

• Pawel Waszkiewicz, University of Warsaw

• Magdalena Tomaszewska-Michalak, University of Warsaw

• Stanislaw Rabczuk, University of Warsaw