Developing core national indicators of public attitudes towards the police in Canada

Police departments regularly conduct public opinion surveys to measure attitudes towards the police. The results of these surveys can be used to shape and evaluate policing policy and practice. Yet the extant evidence base is hampered when people use different methods and when there is no common data standard. In this paper we present a set of 13 core national indicators that can be used by police services across Canada to ensure measurement quality and draw proper comparisons between regions and over time. Having identified a set of 50 survey questions through an expert consultation process, we field those items on a quota sample of 2527 Canadians. Our analysis of the survey data has three stages. First, we use confirmatory factor analysis to assess scale properties. Second, we use substitution analysis to identify 13 single indicators that ‘best stand in’ for each scale. Third, we use the set of 50 and the sub-set of 13 measures to test procedural justice theory for the first time in the Canadian context. Overall, those commissioning and managing public attitudes surveys can use the 13 core indicators as a conceptually-rich and empirically-validated tool through which to understand local survey data in the context of other municipal, provincial, territorial and national contexts

The payment by results Social Impact Bond pilot at HMP Peterborough: final process evaluation report

This report presents findings from a process evaluation of the Peterborough pilot, 4 How, if at all, did the pilot lead to better outcomes of reduced reoffending (including the role played by voluntary and community sector organisations and partner agencies)? What wider costs and benefits, if any, do stakeholders feel were incurred through the implementation of the SIB? To what extent did stakeholders feel that the SIB led to greater innovation and/or efficiency? What were the strengths and weaknesses of the SIB contractual model as implemented? What key messages can be taken from the Peterborough pilot that offer useful learning points for future payment by results models and SIBs?

An evaluation of Social Impact Bonds in Health and Social Care: Interim Report

This interim report describes the progress of the nine ‘Trailblazer’ projects that received funds from the Social Enterprise Investment Fund in 2013 to investigate the feasibility of setting up Social Impact Bond (SIB) projects in health and social care in England. The findings discussed in this report are based on a literature review of the SIB literature and on documentary analysis and qualitative interviews with key informants involved in UK SIB development undertaken between May and November 2014

Tracking Violent Crime with Ambulance Data: How Much Crime Goes Uncounted?

Abstract Research Question What proportion of ambulance records documenting injuries caused by criminal violence is included in police records for violent crimes occurring in the same area at the same dates and times as incidents found in ambulance records? Data We analysed subsets of three datasets during matched time periods: West Midlands Ambulance Service records of all 36,639 incidents of violent injuries from January 2012 to March 2017; 132,317 West Midlands Police records of violent crimes from January 2012 to December 2015; and 9083 records of treatment of violent injuries as recorded in hospital Emergency Department (ED) records covering September 2013 to March 2016. Methods We compared all incidents in the ambulance dataset and ED data to corresponding locations and times in incidents recorded in police datasets. Findings Approximately 90% of cases in the ambulance dataset did not have a corresponding case in the police dataset. The proportion was even lower in the Emergency Department dataset, where less than 5% of cases were successfully matched to a police record. These data suggest that adding the medical data to the police data could add 15 to 20% more violent offences to the totals recorded by the police. Conclusions Tracking identified ambulance data can add substantial numbers of serious violent crimes, over and above those reported to the police. These added cases can increase the targeting of police and public health resources to prevent harm against victims, at places, and by offenders at highest risk of serious violence. </jats:sec

Handling ethical problems in counterterrorism. An inventory of methods to support ethical decisionmaking

This document presents the findings of a study into methods that can help counterterrorism professionals make decisions about ethical problems. The study was commissioned by the Research and Documentation Centre (Wetenschappelijk Onderzoeken Documentatiecentrum, WODC) of the Dutch Ministry of Security and Justice (Ministerie van Veiligheid en Justitie), on behalf of the National Coordinator for Counterterrorism and Security (Nationaal Coördinator Terrorismebestrijding en Veiligheid, NCTV). The research team at RAND Europe was complemented by applied ethics expert Anke van Gorp from the Research Centre for Social Innovation (Kenniscentrum Sociale Innovatie) at Hogeschool Utrecht. The study provides an inventory of methods to support ethical decision-making in counterterrorism, drawing on the experience of other public sectors – healthcare, social work, policing and intelligence – and multiple countries, primarily the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. The report introduces the field of applied ethics; identifies key characteristics of ethical decision-making in counterterrorism; and describes methods that can help counterterrorism professionals make decisions in these situations. Finally, it explores how methods used in other sectors may be applied to ethical decision-making in counterterrorism. It also describes the level of effectiveness that may be expected from the various methods. The report is based on a structured literature search and interviews with professionals and academics with expertise in applied ethics. This report will be of interest to counterterrorism professionals who are responsible for strengthening ethical decision-making in their organisation. It may provide some insights for professionals who seek new methods to help them make ethical decisions. The findings may also be relevant for other professionals, if complemented by a review of decisionmaking characteristics in their sector of specialism

Many Labs 5:Testing pre-data collection peer review as an intervention to increase replicability

Replication studies in psychological science sometimes fail to reproduce prior findings. If these studies use methods that are unfaithful to the original study or ineffective in eliciting the phenomenon of interest, then a failure to replicate may be a failure of the protocol rather than a challenge to the original finding. Formal pre-data-collection peer review by experts may address shortcomings and increase replicability rates. We selected 10 replication studies from the Reproducibility Project: Psychology (RP:P; Open Science Collaboration, 2015) for which the original authors had expressed concerns about the replication designs before data collection; only one of these studies had yielded a statistically significant effect (p < .05). Commenters suggested that lack of adherence to expert review and low-powered tests were the reasons that most of these RP:P studies failed to replicate the original effects. We revised the replication protocols and received formal peer review prior to conducting new replication studies. We administered the RP:P and revised protocols in multiple laboratories (median number of laboratories per original study = 6.5, range = 3?9; median total sample = 1,279.5, range = 276?3,512) for high-powered tests of each original finding with both protocols. Overall, following the preregistered analysis plan, we found that the revised protocols produced effect sizes similar to those of the RP:P protocols (?r = .002 or .014, depending on analytic approach). The median effect size for the revised protocols (r = .05) was similar to that of the RP:P protocols (r = .04) and the original RP:P replications (r = .11), and smaller than that of the original studies (r = .37). Analysis of the cumulative evidence across the original studies and the corresponding three replication attempts provided very precise estimates of the 10 tested effects and indicated that their effect sizes (median r = .07, range = .00?.15) were 78% smaller, on average, than the original effect sizes (median r = .37, range = .19?.50)