A Test of the Differential Involvement Hypothesis

• Published date: 01 April 2019
• Author: Rustu Deryol,James Unnever,Akwasi Owusu-Bempah
• Date: 01 April 2019
• DOI: 10.1177/2153368717697104
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

A Test of the Differential

Involvement Hypothesis

James Unnever

1

, Akwasi Owusu-Bempah

2

and Rustu Deryol

1

Abstract

This research draws on longitudinal data from the Project on Human Development in

Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN) to examine whether African Americans report

more trouble with the police than Latinos, Whites, and members of other racial

groups after controlling for self-reported offending and other covariates. We tested

whether the average self-reports of trouble with the police varied across the neigh-

borhood clusters included within the PHDCN and generated a series of negative

binomial models to assess whether African Americans self-reported more trouble

with the police than others. The results generated from the unconditional hierarchical

model showed that the average self-reports of trouble with the police did not sig-

nificantly vary across the neighborhoods. The negative binomial results indicate that

African Americans report significantly more trouble with the police while controlling

for the respondents’ levels of offending, level of impulsivity, levels of anxiety and

depression, gang membership, their family’s criminal involvement, whether they or

their parents had serious mental health issues, the respondents’ current and expected

economic conditions, their racial affinity, as well as other individual characteristics.

Keywords

race, police, racism, bias, contact

A number of studies document that African Americans report more frequent

encounters with the police than members of other racial groups. The kinds and scope

of these interactions are relatively vast. Scholars have documented them in relation to

1

University of South Florida, Department of Criminology, Sarasota, FL, USA

2

University of Toronto, Department of Sociology, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Corresponding Author:

James Unnever, University of South Florida Sarasota-Manatee, 8350 N Tamiami Trail, Sarasota, FL 34243,

USA.

Email: unnever@sar.usf.edu

Race and Justice

2019, Vol. 9(2) 197-224

ªThe Author(s) 2017

Article reuse guidelines:

sagepub.com/journals-permissions

DOI: 10.1177/2153368717697104

journals.sagepub.com/home/raj

being pulled over and searched while driving (i.e., Driving While Black) (LaFraniere

& Lehren, 2015; Lamberth, 1994; Lundman & Kaufman, 2003), being stopped and

frisked as a pedestrian (Fagan & Geller, 2015; Fagan, Geller, Davies, & West, 2010;

Gelman, Davies, & Kiss, 2007), being arrested (Andersen, 2015; Huizinga et al.,

2007), being subjected to disrespectful treatment (Mastrofski, Reisig, & McCluskey,

2002), and experiencing police use of force (Holmes & Smith, 2012). In addition, a

number of researchers employing qualitative methods (e.g., ethnographies) have

portrayed the ongoing negative interactions that African Americans have with the

police particularly in areas of “compounded deprivation” (Anderson, 1999; Brunson

& Miller, 2006; Perkins & Sampson, 2015; Rios, 2011). Indeed, Rios (2011) found

that only 11 of the 118 minority youths included in his study of delinquency and

criminalization reported any positive experiences with the police. In short, the pre-

vailing evidence suggests that African Americans have significantly greater contact

with the police than members of other racial groups.

Yet, researchers have raised methodological issues that question whether the data

support the conclusion that African Americans have more contact with the police.

Two difficult methodological issues need to be resolved before this conclusion can be

drawn. First, there has to be a significant positive relationship between being black

and increased levels of police contact. The second, and more challenging issue, is that

researchers have to rule out all the other possibilities for why African Americans may

report having had more interactions with the police. That is, they have to eliminate

omitted variable bias to ensure the relationship is not spurious. As Lindsey, Mears,

Cochran, Bales and Stults (2015) point out, researchers cannot conclude that mino-

rities have more contact with the police unless they have ruled out the factors that

could account for troubled police-minority contacts.

Explanations for Disproportionate Minority Contact

Scholars have offered multiple explanations for why African Americans have dis-

proportionate minority contact (DMC) with the police. Conflict and social threat

theories assert that culturally dissimilar minority groups are perceived as a threat to

the established social order, and that the police are employed to control such threats

(Blauner, 1972; Liska, 1992; Weitzer & Tuch, 2002; Wortley & Tanner, 2005).

Conflict and social threat theories suggest that the social control of racial minorities,

including discriminatory police treatment, will increase as the relative size of the

minority population increases (Jacobs & O’Brien, 1998). As such, African Americans

may be subject to the greatest levels of police discrimination in neighborhoods where

they comprise a relatively large or increasing proportion of the population (Stults &

Baumer, 2007). Whereas some studies demonstrate support for the social threat

hypothesis (Liska, Lawrence, & Benson, 1981; McCarthy, 1991), others have not

(Parker & Maggard, 2005; Petrocelli, Piquero, & Smith, 2003).

Research on cognitive and implicit bias provides another perspective useful for

understanding DMC. Implicit bias refers to the attitudes and stereotypes that influence

our understanding, actions, and decision-making processes in an unconscious manner

198 Race and Justice 9(2)