Evaluating the shared and unique predictors of legal cynicism and police legitimacy from adolescence into early adulthood

• Date: 01 February 2020
• Author: Amy Nivette,Denis Ribeaud,Manuel Eisner
• Published date: 01 February 2020
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12230

Received: 21 March 2019 Revised: 1 August 2019 Accepted: 2 August 2019

DOI: 10.1111/1745-9125.12230

ARTICLE

Evaluating the shared and unique predictors of legal

cynicism and police legitimacy from adolescence into

early adulthood∗

Amy Nivette1Manuel Eisner2,3 Denis Ribeaud3

1Department of Sociology, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

2Institute of Criminology, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom

3Jacobs Centre for Productive YouthDevelopment, University of Zurich, Switzerland

Correspondence

AmyNivette, Department of Sociology, Padu-

alaan14, Utrecht University, Utrecht 3584 CH,

TheNetherlands.

Email:a.e.nivette@uu.nl

Fundinginformation

SwissNational Science Foundation,

Grant/AwardNumber: 10FI14_170409

∗Additionalsupporting information

canbe found in the full text tab for this

article in the WileyOnline Librar y at

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/

crim.2020.58.issue-1/issuetoc.

TheZur ichProject on t he Social Development

fromChildhood to Adulthood is cur rently

supported byt he Swiss NationalScience Foun-

dation(SNF) as a research infrastructure [Grant

10FI14_170409].Substantial funding in pre-

viousproject phases was provided by the SNF,

the Jacobs Foundation, the Swiss Federal Office

ofPublic Healt h, the Swiss State Secretariat for

Migration, the Department of Education of the

Cantonof Zur ich,t he Bank Baer Foundation,

andt he VisanaFoundation.

Abstract

In different theoretical traditions, negative social con-

ditions, attachments, and interactions shape the way

individuals view the law and its agents. Although most

researchers acknowledge the conceptual distinction

between different legal attitudes such as legalcynicism and

police legitimacy, it remains unclear to what extent these

attitudes stem from the same social sources. In the current

study, therefore, we evaluate the social and individual

factors that influence trajectories of legal cynicism and

police legitimacy using a diverse community sample of

youths in Zurich, Switzerland. Latent growth curve models

were employed to examine patterns of change in legal

cynicism and police legitimacy between 13 and 20 years

of age. The findings show that legal cynicism and police

legitimacy both decline into early adulthood and exhibit

high rank-stability over time. Furthermore, we find that

legal cynicism is closely related to individual characteris-

tics that reflect one’s inability to recognize or abide by their

internal rules. By contrast, police legitimacy is shaped by

socialization influences, particularly teacher bonds and

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in

any medium, provided the original work is properlycited.

© 2019 The Authors. Criminology published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of American Society of Criminology

70 wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/crim Criminology. 2020;58:70–100.

NIVETTE ET AL.71

police contacts. These results indicate a need to assess the

measurement and interpretation of legal cynicism critically

in relation to broader legitimacy beliefs and to investigate

the shared and distinct sources of these different constructs.

KEYWORDS

latent growth curve analysis, legal cynicism, legal socialization, low self-

control, police legitimacy

Legal attitudes such as legal cynicism and police legitimacy shape the way adolescents interact with

and interpret rules and authorities (Cohn, Bucolo, Rebellon, & van Gundy, 2010; Fagan & Tyler, 2005;

Nivette, Eisner, Malti, & Ribeaud, 2015; Reisig, Wolfe, & Holtfreter, 2011; Trinkner & Cohn, 2014;

Tyler & Trinkner,2017).1Research findings have shown that adolescents and adults who hold negative

attitudes toward the law and police are more likely to offend (Fine et al., 2018; Kaiser & Reisig, 2017;

Reisig et al., 2011) and hold pro-violence attitudes (Nivette, Eisner, & Ribeaud, 2017) and are less

likely to desist (Emery, Jolley, & Wu, 2011). Given the potential importance of legal attitudes as risk

factors for criminal and violent outcomes, researchers are increasingly interested in understanding how

these attitudes develop over the life course (Fagan & Tyler, 2005; McLean, Wolfe, & Pratt, 2018;

Tyler & Trinkner, 2017). Existingresearch findings indicate that legal attitudes, and in particular legal

cynicism, are moderately stable but still changeable during adolescence and early adulthood (Fine &

Cauffman, 2015; Nivette et al., 2015; Schuck, 2013; Stewart, Morris, & Weir, 2014). Few longitudinal

studies, however, have been focused specifically on legal cynicism, and those that have distinguished

between legal cynicism and police legitimacy haverepor ted meaningful differencesin the patter ns and

sources of change between outcomes (e.g., Fagan & Piquero, 2007; Fine& Cauffman, 2015; Kaiser &

Reisig, 2017).

The concept of legal cynicism refers to “the sense in which laws or rules are not considered bind-

ing” (Sampson & Bartusch, 1998, p. 786), and it is used to measure the “degree to which individuals

feel that the law does not apply to them” (Fine & Cauffman, 2015, p. 345; see also Gifford & Reisig,

2019; Nivette et al., 2015). Legalcynicism is conceptually and empirically distinct from the related con-

structs of obligation to obey the law and “cynicism about the law” (Johnson, Maguire, & Kuhns,2014).

“Cynicism about the law,” also known as “legalcor ruption” (Gifford& Reisig, 2019), reflects the per-

ception that the law is a tool used by elites to maintain power and control (Johnson et al., 2014; Tyler

& Huo, 2002). We focus here on the definition and operationalization of legal cynicism by Sampson

and Bartusch (1998), given its prominence in both the neighborhood- and the individual-level research

literature on legal attitudes (Fagan & Tyler, 2005; Fine & Cauffman, 2015; Gifford & Reisig, 2019;

Kaiser & Reisig, 2017; Nivette et al., 2015; Trinkner & Cohn, 2014; Trinkner, Rodrigues, Piccirillo,

Gifford, & Gomes, 2019).

Procedural justice refers to individual judgments regarding the fairness of treatment bypolice (Tyler,

2006), whereas legitimacy attitudes typically refer to the belief that institutions are justified in their use

of power (Fagan & Tyler, 2005; Jackson & Gau, 2016). The term “police legitimacy,” however, is often

used to capture broader perceptions of police performance, including procedural justice, lawfulness,

1In this article, we use the term “legal attitudes” as an umbrella term to refer to the broad array of attitudes and orientations

related to legal and criminal justice institutions, including the courts, police, and law.