Among Law Enforcement Agencies
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Introduction
Maintaining an adequate police personnel level is one of the most prominent challenges currently facing the field of law enforcement. The supply and demand for competent officers are going to be changed due to intensifying law enforcement errands, escalating attrition and declining resources. These challenges might have initiated throughout the latest economic recession and actually worsened as the economy improved (Wilson & Weiss, 2014). The question arises whether the durable obligation of applicants and current officers will continue in times of economic development since enrollment and retention of officers have both become an escalating challenge for police agencies (Chalfin & McCrary, 2013). The purpose of this proposed research is to address the following research question: are factors and issues of retention rates within police agencies related to the years served with an agency by a law enforcement officer?
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changing expectations of police officers and also make them look out for better and other opportunities within their existing organizations or into different organizations.
Research Design
During the planning and development for this research study a lengthy review of literature was conducted, research questions were developed and determined, and procedures of data collection were decided. For the purposes of this research project, a non-experimental cross-sectional design will allow for an exploration into the possible variables affecting police retention rates in American law enforcement agencies. As previously mentioned, the total population of current and former law enforcement officers is far too vast a population for this study, and therefore, the sample population is derived from completed data sets included in scholarly studies discussing police retention rates.
Exploratory research is most often utilized when the research design calls for secondary, rather than primary, data. Exploring the variables enables the recognition and detection of patterns, themes, and relationships that exist among the secondary data. This is why this study is characterized as non-experimental rather than experimental or quasi-experimental. The latter two forms of research design do not as easily enable researchers to explore topics from varying approaches and angles (Shadish et al., 2003). Additionally, this study is void an experimental design, research participants and a control group, most of which are needed to conduct true experimental and quasi-experimental research. For the purposes of this research, exploratory research allows for the utilization of both qualitative and quantitative data, allowing the researcher to recognize important factors. A non-experimental research design typically allows more room for errors when compared to well-constructed experimental and quasi-experimental designs.
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In order to effectively address the proposed research question, literary sources citing and discussing findings pertaining to personnel issues and rates of officers currently and formerly serving in a police agency were utilized and obtained through various studies located in the ICPSR. Unlike other studies conducted on this topic, this study will be using the collected data to identify possible variables and factors that influence an officer’s decision to leave their agency solely in relation to the time they have served. In other words, this research seeks to determine whether or not different factors and issues of retention rates within police agencies are related to the years served with an agency by a law enforcement officer. Preciously conducted studies utilized officer interviews and entrance and exit surveys to determine factors affecting retention rates, but fail to discuss these finding from the perspective of years served as a law enforcement officer.
In addition, a content analysis of the findings will be conducted in order to identify reoccurring variables derived from police personnel interviews and surveys. It is the aims of this research to identify the most prevalent retention issues listed by current and previous officers at one-year, five-years, and more than 10 years of time served with an agency. Officers that have left the occupational field due to retirement will still be included in the sample for this research design.
Data Collection
The study design consisted of two steps in the collection of secondary data, including administrative records data, aggregate data, and census data that was located during a lengthy literature review from other studies conducted on the topic. The first step consisted of collecting quantitative studies centering on numerical rates of law enforcement officers and their time served within an agency. Measurements of an officer’s career would involve the length of their career
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with the same agency (Wilson & Weiss, 2014). The control group would be the finding where an officer places in the time in service category:
- Further to give them day (one) to one year. The officers’ a year (and one day) until five years. (2) Five years (one day) until 10 years. 10 years (and one day) until 15 years. 15 years (and one day) until 20 years. 20 years (and one day) until 25 years of service in the same agency.
These studies included the percentage of police officers that are likely to be employed both short and long term within an agency before either leaving the agency for discharge of duties, forced retirement or removal for reasons undue to the officer changing careers or transferring to another agency in law enforcement (McMurray et al., 2010; Wilson et al., 2010; Wilson & Weiss, 2014).
This research takes advantage of the vast academic network of secondary data that is stored through the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR). The ICPSR allowed for access to a wide variety of useful statistics, literary pieces, and other data that has previously been collected from government, academic, and private research to answer the proposed research questions. Data sets and other information have been obtained through an individualized search that utilizes the internet to access applicable databases.
One data set utilized in this study originated from the 2007 National Directory of Law Enforcement Administrators (NDLEA). The NDLEA is a list of police agencies that has been utilized for sampling in numerous research studies. Wilson, Weiss, & Fan (2008), for example, limited the population of their study to 300 sworn officers from 146 departments around the United States in 2006 and 2007 (ICPSR29162-vl). Mailing information was obtained, and
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constructed surveys were distributed to all 146 departments included in the study, with a total of 107 successfully completing the survey. Respondents were given adequate time to obtained official records regarding the hiring, training, and termination of law enforcement officers. Therefore, the samples obtained by the researchers obtained samples through the NDLEA were solely from large police agencies.
Sample
This research will analyze publicly obtained data from the National Directory of Law Enforcement Administrators (NDLEA). The NDLEA is a comprehensive list of police agencies that has been utilized for sampling in numerous research studies. As previously mentioned, most of the studies used for this research include a large sample of 149 police agencies with at least 300 sworn law enforcement officers. The unit of analysis of the accessible populations in the majority of the studies is groups because they survey the entire police agency.
For the purpose of this proposal, the sample will include previously employed law enforcement officers that left their policing agency, switched to a different agency within law enforcement, or left the field of policing indefinitely, similar to other studies conducted on the topic (Gordon, 2004; Koper et al., 2001; McMurray et al., 2010; Simmons, 2012; Wilson et al., 2010; Wilson & Grammich, 2009). Even though the population sample is rather large, there exists a vast academic network of data that is stored through the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR). The ICPSR allowed for access to a wide variety of statistics and other data that has previously been collected from government, academic, and private research to answer the proposed research questions.
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Validity and Threats to Validity
According to Shadish et al. (2003), there are numerous possible threats to a research study that can hinder the overall validity. Each type of research study and design carries with it a different set of threats, and additionally, varying ways to generate unbiased, reliable, and generalizable results. External, internal, and construct validity all serve as measures of validating research, or in other words, intends on proving that a research study measured what it intended to measure.
Internal Validity
While the main purpose of this study is to explore possible variables affecting police retention rates, we do know that research suggests a relationship between personnel issues and the amount of time an officer serves with an agency. This study, however, does not intend to prove a causal relationship, but rather to explore the causes of poor police retention rates. The main threat to the internal validity of this research would be concluding that a definite relationship exists among variables when that was not the intended measure of this study.
External Validity
External validity focuses on the concept of generalization, and whether or not the findings from a research study would prove consistent when tested across time, location, and populations (Shadish et al., 2003). Most of the literature used in this study includes large police agencies in their populations since the information is more readily available. Therefore, there is uncertainty as to whether or not the findings of this study would be applicable to much smaller
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agencies, such as those with less than 50 sworn officers. The threats to the external validity in this study further suggest the need for future research on the topic.
Construct Validity
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References
Chalfin, A., & McCrary, J. (2013). The effect of police on crime: New evidence from US cities,
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Gordon, M. (2004). Police recruiting in the 21st century. EMU School of Police Staff
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Koper, C. S., Moore, G. E., Maguire, E. R., & Huffer, D. E. (2001). Hiring, training, and
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Wilson, J. M., & Grammich, C. A. (2009). Police recruitment and retention in the Contemporary
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