Police Investigators’ Attitudes Toward
Victims of Crime: A Quantitative Study
Marcy Hehnly
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How my research began and why I chose to focus on
attitudes of citizens towards victims of crime.
• There is limited research on the attitudes of specialized
unit investigators toward victims they interact with while
attempting to solve crime. Based on the fact that there
exists limited research, there is a need to understand why
investigators react toward victims in the manner in which
they do.
Statement of the Problem
• This research set out to prove or disprove that there may or
may not exist a relationship between the investigating officer
and the victim of a violent crime which can be influenced by
the investigators professional experiences of behavioral
observations, perceptions of victims of these crime types, the
overall treatment of crime victims, and their job knowledge
regarding crime victim behaviors. Specifically, it sought to
predict if an investigator’s age and work experience positively
or negatively affected the personal observations of a victim,
personal experience with a victim, perceptions of a victim, and
determine if these two factors influenced what they know
about their job.
Purpose of the Study
• What is the relationship between an investigators work
experience, age, and their personal observations of a
victim(s)?
• What is the relationship between an investigators work
experience, age, and personal perceptions of a victim(s)?
• What is the relationship between an investigators work
experience, age, and their victim encounters/treatment?
• What is the relationship between an investigators work
experience, age and his/her self-knowledge?
Research Questions
• By recognizing and understanding if there were
significant explanations toward the relationship between
investigators and citizens, communities as a whole could
function more cohesively, thus explaining why it was
important for further research in this area.
• Additionally, by conducting research of investigating
officers, agencies were better able to determine if they
need to professionalize and provide more training to their
officers to meet the goals of not only the agency but the
partnership which exists with community members.
Significance of the Study
• There are both positive and negative perceptions received
by investigators of violent crimes which affect their
overall attitude of the case and assisting the victim of the
crime. These attitudes are recognized to have come from
the socialization process and experiences of past victim
interviews. This can also come in the form of many other
police stressors to include overall organizational stress,
the public’s views of law enforcement, and the day to day
interactions with citizens.
Assumptions of the
Research
• It was further assumed that investigators will be
stakeholders within the study so that others are better able
to understand their perceptions and to show how they
themselves as well as victims had the propensity to
influence the overall case thus answering the questions to
the best of their ability and truthfully.
Assumptions of the
Research
• The number of participants that had the potential to
participate in the research was limited based on the size
of the investigatory units of each police agency, more
specifically those who currently worked within the
domestic violence, rape, robbery and/or aggravated
assault units.
Limitations of Research
• The social conflict theory recognizes how relationships exist
within groups of people, social relations, and the way
individuals interpret social situations. This is recognized in
police, victim, and suspect relationships as well as police to
police relationships. Through this theoretical foundation,
research recognizes that criminal investigations have
influencing factors on the investigators’ behaviors which in
many instances is a level of prestige and cultural norms within
law enforcement as a whole. In recognizing these biases,
investigations and interrogations can produce both positive and
negative results.
Theoretical Framework
• The social structure theory focuses on established
patterns of relationships among groups of people. This
theory recognizes the propensity to treat others differently
based on created subcultures or understood expectations
of one another. Within law enforcement subcultures
researchers have recognized that there exist varying
attitudes among the same type of subculture. It also
recognizes that many different groups are all connected in
some form or fashion, thus showing that in fact police
and victims of crime do have some type of relationship
with one another.
Theoretical Framework
• The researcher used quantitative analysis to study
specialized unit investigators’ attitudes toward victims of
crime through surveys.
• Justification: When attempting to gain data from a larger
population which can be representative of a group,
quantitative analysis and methodology are considered the
most practiced method through the use of surveys.
Research Design
• The sample population was originally supposed to come
from 7 metropolitan Atlanta Police Departments which
were considered large in the state of Georgia; however,
only 6 agencies participated in the final survey
distribution.
• All agencies had 125 certified officers or more.
• For this particular research, it was the goal of the
researcher to obtain a minimum of 90 respondents.
Research Design
• Research was conducted in investigatory units which
work aggravated assault, robbery, rape, and domestic
violence cases.
• The survey which was distributed to all participants was
originally created and used by Dr. Karl Ask (2011) in his
research within the Journal of Interpersonal Violence
titled “Police officers’ and prosecutors’ beliefs about
crime victim behaviors.”
Research Design
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Section 1- demographics
Section 2- employment status
Section 3- personal observations
Section 4- personal perceptions
Section 5- victim encounters/treatment
Section 6- self-knowledge of investigator
Measures
• Meeting with department head/instructions
• Distribution of cover letters, surveys, consent forms, drop
box
• Pick up date announced as well as posted on the side of
the drop box
• Anonymity
Data Collection
Procedures
• By using multiple linear regression, the researcher was able to
“see what impact multiple variables have on an outcome.”
• By running multiple linear regressions on the collected data,
the researcher could predict whether a person's age or work
experience would impact (Positively or Negatively) his or her
personal observation of a victim, predicted whether a person's
age or work experience impacted (Positively or Negatively) his
or her personal perceptions of a victim, predicted whether a
person's age or work experience impacted (Positively or
Negatively) his or her encounters with a victim, and predicted
whether a person's age or work experience correlated with how
much they knew about their job.
Data Analysis
• The overall potential sample consisted of 197 possible
participants.
• The respondents included a total of 143 investigators’ who met
the guidelines to participate in the study which reflected a
72.58% return rate of the surveys distributed.
• As the surveys were returned, it was easily recognized that
although many worked in a specific crime type unit, they, in
fact worked multiple crime types.
• 119 participants worked all crime types while only 24 worked
less than 4 crime types.
• Another observable fact potentially indicated the investigators
were able to provide additional information based on their
overall diversity of handling various types of crimes outside of
their specialization.
Sample
• Hypothesis #1: The relationship between an investigator’s
work experience and age will be associated with less bias
based on their personal observations.
• Hypothesis #2: The relationship between an investigator’s
work experience and age will be associated with less bias
during an investigation based on personal perceptions of
a victim.
Hypothesis
• Hypothesis #3: The relationship between an investigator’s
work experience and age will be associated with less bias
during an investigation based on their victim encounters
and treatment.
• Hypothesis #4: The relationship between an investigator’s
work experience and age will be associated with less bias
during an investigation based on his/her self-knowledge.
Hypothesis
• Null hypothesis: There was no difference between an
investigator’s work experience and age in terms of their
personal observations of a victim, their personal
perceptions of a victim, their victim encounters and
treatment, and the investigator’s self-knowledge of victim
interactions.
Hypothesis
• The youngest investigator was 26 years old while the
oldest was 56 years old; the average age of an officer
being 38 and a half years old.
• The shortest amount of time an investigator had been
working in an investigatory capacity totaled 2 years while
the longest time was 28 years. The average amount of
time an investigator worked within an investigatory unit
was approximately 12.7 years.
Results
• An investigator’s age and work experience did not demonstrate
a significant relationship toward the overall personal
observation of a crime victim.
• Age and work experience also were not viewed as a significant
factor in an investigator’s personal perceptions showing bias
towards a crime victim.
• An investigator’s age and work experience also did not reflect
biases towards victims of crime as they related to victim
encounters and treatment.
• Last, age and work experience of investigator’s did not
influence biases towards victims of crimes based on their selfknowledge of crime victims; thus, showing they are receiving
adequate training in their specialization.
Results
• The results of this research study showed that law
enforcement investigators’ working in specialized crime
units did not show significant proportions of variance
within their investigations towards victims of criminal
activity and remained neutral throughout the course of
their duties. This varies from studies within law
enforcement in that the creditability of witnesses could
influence how an investigator handles a case when the
victim presents actions of lying and deceit within the
investigation of a crime.
Results
• Upon receipt of the current research surveys being
returned, the results showed that investigators’ have a
genuine concern for those they come in contact with and
negate previous studies which show general biases
towards the public.
• This survey varied in the results from Ask (2010) based
on his comparison of prosecutors and law enforcement.
This survey did not include prosecutors; therefore, it is
not surprising that the results were different.
Results
• Regardless of the victims background, race, gender, or other
factors such as socioeconomic status these investigators treated
the victim as a person and handled the case in a nonbiased
fashion to see the case to a resolution. In showing this and
recognizing various social structures and conflict theories, the
research showed that regardless of cultural norms between
groups of people, law enforcement investigators treat their
victims fairly and equally. It also showed that socially, these
two groups of people can form a relationship together that can
be positive versus a stigma of having a negative relationship
with community members.
Results
• Data was not gained in regards to comparing sizes of law
enforcement agencies, an investigators race or their
gender.
• Additionally, more data can be gained by conducting
surveys of individual crime types instead of multiple
which could potentially show varied differences among
types of investigations.
Results
• One limitation of the study was that one law enforcement
agency failed to respond to the survey distribution which
eliminated additional information that could have been
used within this this study to further assist in answering
the research questions. The lack of participation by this
agency decreased the sample population by 30 surveys.
Limitations
• Another limitation is that although the request to
participate was specific to investigators, the survey may
have led participants to believe they were answering
questions that spanned across their entire career versus
only their time within an investigatory unit.
Limitations
• Further research should be considered in the area of
comparing gender as they relate to handling victims of
crime to see if there are differences among investigator’s
and citizens. Additionally, it is recommended that
research be conducted on individual crime types instead
of several on one questionnaire.
• It is also recommended that practitioners examine more
closely the self-knowledge section to determine the
overall training that is provided to investigators and
recognize if there is a need for furtherance of education
within organizations.
Recommendations for
Further Research
• Lastly, continued research could also focus on comparing
non-violent crimes to that of violent crimes to see if there
is a relationship between the crime types and how victims
respond.
Recommendations for
Further Research