Stop, Children, What’s That Sound? The Unintended Consequences of Police Contact on Juveniles

In 2013, a federal judge overturned the New York City Police Department’s policy of “stop, question, and frisk.” Opponents of the policy voiced concern that the constitutional rights of minorities, who allegedly were disproportionally targeted, were being violated. The NYCPD has said that this policy has been crucial in reducing major crime and violence, saving the lives of many of the city’s black and Hispanic residents. Other cities including Chicago, Los Angeles, Newark, and Philadelphia follow some version, formally and informally, of “stop, question, and frisk.” Gaining an understanding of the costs and benefits of this policy is important to accessing the level of positive outcomes it actually produces.

Stephanie Ann Wiley, Lee Ann Slocum, and Finn-Aage Esbensen, in the 2013 paper, “The Unintended Consequences of Being Stopped or Arrested: An Exploration of the Labeling Mechanisms Through Which Police Contact Leads To Subsequent Delinquency,” look at the effect of “stop, question, and frisk” on juveniles over a four-year period. The paper tracks over 2,000 middle-school students from seven major US cities to see if their interactions with police affects their likelihood of exhibiting various delinquent behaviors. The authors are interested in whether contact with police changes the individual’s self-perception in a way that increases deviant behavior and reduces positive engagement in their community.

The researchers try to identify what characteristics make youth that come into contact with police different from their peers who had not been in contact with police. Since running a randomized control trial for police engagement with juveniles would be both tricky and likely unadvisable, the authors rely on self-reporting of the participants. First, the authors control for specific variables: age, sex, race, and initial levels of delinquent behavior. They then use a technique called propensity score matching to try to reduce any false correlations between police contact and delinquency. This type of experimental design allows for the creation of separate groups that are similar on observable characteristics so that the treatment effects can be compared. The groups are balanced based on their observed characteristics to make sure the groups themselves are not biased.

To gain a more complete understanding of the effect of variables of interest (such as grades, pro-social peers, delinquent peers, neutralization, etc.) that may have a concurrent effect on the juveniles being studied, the researchers use a path modeling designto parcel out the importance of each variable. These two designs are carried out for three groups of middle school students—arrested, stopped, and no contact—over four time periods to measure the effect of interaction with police over time.

Individuals who are stopped or arrested report a significantly lower level of anticipating guilt and a higher level of neutralization—justifying why their actions are acceptable—for their delinquent behavior. They also report having lower grades and more delinquent peers than youth who had not come into contact with police. The main difference between the youth who are arrested and those who are only stopped by police is that those charged reported having more delinquent friends.

Since research has shown that juvenile involvement in the judicial system can often lead to recidivism as an adult, it is important to determine how to stymie this pipeline to reduce overall rates of crime and violence. To create age-appropriate policing strategies, it is useful to understand ways in which police contact with juveniles may unintentionally lead to increased levels of deviant behavior. The study highlights variables that tend to have the biggest impact on effected youth continuing undesired patterns of behavior, which may make it easier to design relevant interventions. Since brain development is not complete in the students being studied here, they may be more susceptible to interventions—be it positive ones from positively engaged peers or adults or negative ones from delinquent youth.

In trying to keep the American justice system both equitable and effective, it is important to look not only at the seemingly obvious effects of policing polices but also potential unintended consequences. Avoiding actions that may actually increase the likelihood of youth to self-identify as a delinquent and thus amplify deviant behaviors could reduce crime in the long run. Looking at the long-term costs and benefits of police implementing stop-and-frisk type policies on juveniles may help to determine if other strategies may be more appropriate. A greater understanding of factors contributing to increased delinquency would be useful in crafting more effective intervention policies that facilitate the reduction in crime and violence that stop-and-frisk polices aims to achieve.

Article Source: Stephanie Ann Wiley, Lee Ann Slocum, and Finn-Aage Esbensen, “The Unintended Consequences of Being Stopped or Arrested: An Exploration of the Labeling Mechanisms Through Which Police Contact Leads To Subsequent Delinquency,” Criminology, November 2013.

Feature Photo: cc/(Curtis Perry)