Theses and Dissertations

Date of Award

2024

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy in Education

Department

Abraham S. Fischler College of Education and School of Criminal Justice

Advisor

Tina Jaeckle

Committee Member

Marcelo Castro

Committee Member

Jessica D. Ganao

Keywords

Campus Police Cooperation, Campus Police Legitimacy, Campus Police Reporting, Criminal Justice Majors, Moderation Analysis, Procedural Justice

Abstract

Investigating crimes on college campuses is a prevalent phenomenon that often requires student cooperation with campus police. Using the procedural justice theory’s process-based approach, this applied research examined the likelihood of students reporting campus crime based on their perceived legitimacy of campus police and whether the student’s academic major moderated the relationship. The study used a quantitative, non-experimental design employing non-probability sampling methods.

Procedural justice is a theoretical approach that explains cooperation with police as the result of interactions. The theory asserts that regardless of the outcome, when citizens perceive interactions with police as procedurally just and fair, they are likely to develop the belief that police officers are legitimate and should be obeyed. This obeyance is often measured as cooperation. This study applied the procedural justice process to a sample of college students to measure cooperation with campus police through campus crime reporting. Another study objective was determining if academic majors moderated the legitimacy/reporting relationship. In this case, academic major was measured as criminal justice students who have taken a law enforcement course. To execute the study, surveys were provided to 122 students from a small urban University in the Southeastern United States. Results revealed that procedural justice opinions contributed significantly to the presence of legitimacy perceptions. However, contrary to most procedural justice literature, legitimacy perceptions did not positively predict campus police reporting. In addition, being a criminal justice major who has taken a law enforcement course did not moderate the association between legitimacy and campus crime reporting. The findings provided implications for campus police and university policies and procedures and for the applicability of procedural justice when considering African American student populations.

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