Methods and Methodology
As a post-positivist, I intend to do my research through a traditional quantitative approach; however, I do believe that causes determine outcomes. Therefore, I believe there is a strong correlation between the national number of police brutality cases and the years of each case. Using documented police brutality cases as my unit of analysis, I have four hypothesis I intend to test:
#1: Since the initial landmark policy, the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, the number of police brutality cases decreased.
#2: For a period of about 15 years, the amount of police brutality cases are most likely consistent on a yearly basis.
#3: The number of police brutality cases began to grow and peaked recently …show more content…
One intervening variable to consider in this study is the court system’s classification of the police-suspect interaction. If a police officer is not indicted for his/her crime of “police brutality”, it will not be found on record. I am aware that many police brutality cases are “swept under the rug” and are not registered. Here, I can only use the data available to me. A strong moderating variable is the types of policies being implemented in the time segment that is being tested as they may directly affect the number of police brutality cases in that …show more content…
To test hypothesis #3, I will compare the number of police brutality cases within the ranges of 2000-2005 and 2009 -2014. These year segments demonstrate that as policy was stricter in the early 2000’s and has dwindle within the last five to six year, there may be a spike in the number of police brutality cases. Here I am looking for a small, negative coefficient (r) (-.1 ≤ x ≥ -0.3), indicating a very small correlation, which would indicate that there is a statistically significant variation in the number of police brutality cases in these year segments. The negative aspect of the results indicates that from 2000-2005, the number of cases were decreasing or stagnant, but from 2009-2014, the number of cases has continued to increase, which would prove this hypothesis. 6. To test hypothesis #4, I will compare the number of police brutality cases from 1991-1995 and 2010-2014 using Pearson’s correlation model once again. Here, I am looking for a large, negative coefficient (r) (-.5 ≤ x ≥ - 1.0) to identify that there is a strong correlation, which would indicate that the amount of police brutality cases is not significantly different over the longer time period where multiple policies have been
As a post-positivist, I intend to do my research through a traditional quantitative approach; however, I do believe that causes determine outcomes. Therefore, I believe there is a strong correlation between the national number of police brutality cases and the years of each case. Using documented police brutality cases as my unit of analysis, I have four hypothesis I intend to test:
#1: Since the initial landmark policy, the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, the number of police brutality cases decreased.
#2: For a period of about 15 years, the amount of police brutality cases are most likely consistent on a yearly basis.
#3: The number of police brutality cases began to grow and peaked recently …show more content…
One intervening variable to consider in this study is the court system’s classification of the police-suspect interaction. If a police officer is not indicted for his/her crime of “police brutality”, it will not be found on record. I am aware that many police brutality cases are “swept under the rug” and are not registered. Here, I can only use the data available to me. A strong moderating variable is the types of policies being implemented in the time segment that is being tested as they may directly affect the number of police brutality cases in that …show more content…
To test hypothesis #3, I will compare the number of police brutality cases within the ranges of 2000-2005 and 2009 -2014. These year segments demonstrate that as policy was stricter in the early 2000’s and has dwindle within the last five to six year, there may be a spike in the number of police brutality cases. Here I am looking for a small, negative coefficient (r) (-.1 ≤ x ≥ -0.3), indicating a very small correlation, which would indicate that there is a statistically significant variation in the number of police brutality cases in these year segments. The negative aspect of the results indicates that from 2000-2005, the number of cases were decreasing or stagnant, but from 2009-2014, the number of cases has continued to increase, which would prove this hypothesis. 6. To test hypothesis #4, I will compare the number of police brutality cases from 1991-1995 and 2010-2014 using Pearson’s correlation model once again. Here, I am looking for a large, negative coefficient (r) (-.5 ≤ x ≥ - 1.0) to identify that there is a strong correlation, which would indicate that the amount of police brutality cases is not significantly different over the longer time period where multiple policies have been