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Race/Ethnicity, Area and Willingness to Call Police

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Abstract

Using survey data from a large national sample of U.S. residents, this study examines how and why individuals’ race/ethnicity and perceived area crime risk influence their willingness to call police. Structural equation modeling tests a combined parallel-sequential multiple-mediator model that ties the normative (e.g., police legitimacy) and instrumental (e.g., concern about crime) perspectives of calling police to the profound issues of race, area, and policing. A wide range of individual sociodemographic traits and experience with crime and the police were also controlled in the analysis. The results reveal a clear distinction between Blacks and Whites in their likelihood of seeking police assistance, but no difference between Hispanics and Whites in these intentions. While the normative model highlighting police legitimacy best explains the racial gap in calling police, the instrumental model accentuating concern about crime better accounts for the area influences on willingness to call police.

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Notes

  1. The highest VIFs were for police procedural justice (VIF = 4.44) and legitimacy (VIF = 3.99), whose correlation was expected as a great deal of research has documented a strong correlation between the two (Pina-Sánchez & Brunton-Smith, 2020). All the other VIFs are below 2.5.

  2. Americans’ confidence in police has dropped to a record low according to Gallup poll (2020).

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  1. Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Wayne State University, 48202, Detroit, MI, USA

    Yuning Wu

  2. Department of Criminal Justice, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 89154, Las Vegas, NV, USA

    Terance D. Miethe

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Wu, Y., Miethe, T.D. Race/Ethnicity, Area and Willingness to Call Police. Am J Crim Just 49, 121–144 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12103-022-09691-8

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