Impact of Community Policing Training and Program Implementation on Police Personnel in Arizona, 1995-1998 (ICPSR 3789)

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Study Purpose View help for Study Purpose

In 1995, the Phoenix Regional Training Academy revised its basic training curriculum and implemented a 606.5-hour, 16-week basic training program that integrated community policing and problem-oriented policing across the curriculum. The revised curriculum was designed to provide a range of supportive concepts and skills, including teaching officers how to develop positive police-community relations and the ways in which community policing techniques are helpful in dealing with crime. The curriculum also placed substantial emphasis on enhancing individuals' sensitivity to and awareness of cultural and ethnic differences. This study aimed to: (1) evaluate the extent to which the academy's basic training program produced desired changes in officers' attitudes and beliefs related to community policing, problem-oriented policing, and police-citizen interactions, (2) track a panel of academy graduates through the first year of their police careers in their respective police agencies to evaluate the effects of field training, occupational socialization, community policing, and different work environments (e.g., department size and constituencies with different needs and demands) on officers' attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors related to traditional policing, community policing, and police-citizen interactions, and (3) track academy dropouts and determine if and how their attitudes and values differed systematically from non-dropouts.

Study Design View help for Study Design

A multiple-treatment single-case design was used to study 446 police recruits from 14 successive academy classes that began basic training classes at the Phoenix Regional Training Academy between December 1995 and October 1996. The Police Personnel Survey, adapted from Rosenbaum, Yeh, and Wilkinson (1994), Skogan (1994, 1995), and Wycoff and Skogan (1993), was administered to officers in the study on four separate occasions. This instrument was designed to take repeated measures of police officer attitudes and beliefs related to various dimensions of the job, including job satisfaction, community policing, problem-solving policing, traditional policing, the role of the police, relations with the community, and multicultural sensitivity. The first administration (pretest) of the survey took place on police recruits' first day at the academy. Training academy administrators provided researchers with one hour of class time during which the survey was administered and collected immediately upon completion. A 16-week lag existed between the pretest (time one) and the first post-test (time two), which was conducted during the final three days of the basic training academy. The second post-test (time three) occurred 12 weeks after the first post-test, between June 1996 and March 1997, at or near the end of the recruits' field training process. To conduct the second post-test, each recruit was tracked to his or her respective police agency. A third post-test (time four) occurred at the end of officers' one-year probationary period, between March 1997 and February 1998.

Sample View help for Sample

Twenty-five police agencies across the state of Arizona had recruits in the final sample, and each academy class had representatives from several different police agencies. Police agencies included metropolitan police agencies, small town/rural police agencies, sheriff offices, Indian tribal police agencies, and university police agencies. More information about sampling procedures was not provided.

Universe View help for Universe

Members of 14 successive classes at the Phoenix Regional Training Academy that began between December 1995 and October 1996.

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Description of Variables View help for Description of Variables

Background variables include gender, race/ethnicity, age, prior military experience, prior law enforcement experience, marital and family status, education, previous work experiences, hobbies/non-work activities, occupational history of parents, agency hired by, and Myers-Briggs personality type. Other variables focus on job description, interest in job challenges and personal growth through work, receptivity to change, job satisfaction, patrol responsiveness to community, to what extent the agency's/department's resources should be committed to community-oriented policing, hours spent in an average week on different policing activities, what sources of information contribute to officers' recognition of a problem, orientation to community-oriented policing, assessment of police-public relations, familiarity with community-based and problem-solving policing, problem-solving capability, rating of different types of training in respective departments, orientation toward problem-solving policing, multicultural awareness and knowledge, coworker support for community policing, and coworker support for traditional policing.

Response Rates View help for Response Rates

not available

Presence of Common Scales View help for Presence of Common Scales

Scales include Myers-Briggs personality type and several Likert-type scales.

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Original Release Date View help for Original Release Date

2003-11-21

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