Removing Discriminatory Racial Profiling in Criminal Profiling - Assignment Example

Research Methodology: Removing Discriminatory Racial Profiling in Criminal Profiling Research Design The overall research design for this study is a mixed-methods study because the research questions call for both quantitative and qualitative data-collection methods and analyses. The first research question (RQ1) is: How is racial profiling integrated into criminal profiling? The second research question (RQ2) is: How can the police integrate racial profiling into criminal profiling in ways that improve the scientific validity and reliability of the latter and reduce discriminatory profiling? A quantitative data-collection method will answer RQ1, particularly through a survey, because it will ask the police about their current racial profiling methods are and if they think that their racial profiling methods are discriminator or not. Secondary research is also important because it will validate the survey’s profiling practices and enrich knowledge about racial profiling issues across the country. Qualitative and quantitative data-collection methods will also answer RQ2. The survey will have open-ended questions about what the police think about racial profiling and how they can include it in criminal profiling without sacrificing the validity and reliability of profiling methods and findings. An interview with a criminology or criminal justice professor will also be essential in understanding academic ideas on offender profiling validity and reliability. Subjects for Study The populations under study are the police and criminology/criminal justice professors and the sampling method is convenience sampling because of its advantages over other methods. Convenience sampling is an advantageous method because it is an easy, cost- and time-efficient method for selecting respondents (Maxfield & Babbie, 2011, p. 224). Its economy ensures that the study will not create undue financial burden on the researcher. Furthermore, another advantage of convenience sampling is that the researcher can choose participants who are willing to respond and who possess skills and knowledge in answering pertinent survey and interview questions. Convenience sampling has its disadvantages, however. Because it is a non-probability sampling method, it may find respondents who might not be representative of the general population (Gravetter & Forzano, 2012, p. 151). The resulting sampling may be biased because the researcher cannot ensure the randomness of the selection process (Gravetter & Forzano, 2012, p. 151). This major drawback can be managed, nonetheless, through finding reasonable representatives (Gravetter & Forzano, 2012, p. 151). For example, random sampling is still applied on a chosen police unit. This action will help improve the generalization of the findings on the police. In addition, the research will provide an ample description of who the respondents are in terms of pertinent characteristics (Gravetter & Forzano, 2012, p. 152). The description can help readers draw their own conclusions from the sampling’s representativeness of the population (Gravetter & Forzano, 2012, p. 151). As for ethics and confidentiality, the researcher will obtain informed consent, prevent harm to respondents, and ensure anonymity and confidentiality. The researcher will acquire informed consent by speaking face-to-face with the head of the police department to discuss the goals and importance of the research to the police and the community and to explain the study’s ethical concerns and resolutions (Noaks & Wincup, 2004). The informed consent of all participants is essential and the researcher will attain this through describing the research to them through an e-mail and being open to being contacted for further questions and concerns. Respondents must fully understand what the research is about and the methods for data collection and analysis before consenting to the study. Furthermore, the researcher will make sure that no harm will fall upon the respondents by protecting their identities and by not including questions that can have negative psychological effects on them. In addition, the researcher will ensure anonymity by not recording the names of subjects and ascribing numbers to the latter, as well as not taking personal information that can connect the data to specific individuals (Maxfield & Babbie, 2011, p. 63). As for confidentiality, the records will be put in a safe place with a lock and documented as a computer file that has a password. Whenever it cannot be avoided that the study needs some names or specific personal information, recording them through a master file with password will enhance data confidentiality. Measurement The independent variables are current practices and guidelines for racial and offender profiling, while the dependent variables are racial profiling and criminal profiling. For RQ1, the survey and secondary research will provide qualitative and quantitative data on how racial profiling occurs. Racial profiling refers to the sum of these current racial profiling practices and guidelines/policies. For RQ2, the survey will ask the police about their ideas about the validity and reliability of racial and offender profiling methods. An interview with a criminology or criminal justice professor will enhance the qualitative data because he/she will provide an academic perspective on profiling methods. For the instrumentation, the survey and interview questionnaires will be based on the research questions and secondary research. The researcher will create these questionnaires using existing questionnaires that ask the same questions or ask related questions for the police and criminology processors. For levels of measurement, nominal measures pertain to gender, race, age, educational background, job position, marital status, and years of service. Ordinal measures refer to opinions of the police and their classifications using categorization. In addition, for the qualitative data, answers will be put into categories that somehow generalize their characteristics. Categorization will help create ordinal measures for the data. In addition, the researcher will ensure the reliability and validity of the measurement methods through conducting a pre-testing of these methods on two police officers and one criminology professor. Pre-testing can identify weaknesses in validity and reliability. Furthermore, the survey will have a number of questions that can check the reliability of answers because they appear as simultaneous forms of measurement (Gravetter & Forzano, 2012, p. 87). As for the study’s validity, convenience sampling reduces the external validity of the measures and findings. Nonetheless, the results of the study can have implications for the police with careful analysis. Moreover, regarding internal validity, the researcher can improve internal validity through using theoretical bases in connecting the questions to the study variables. Furthermore, the researcher will use multiple measures through secondary research, survey, and interviews to further understand racial and offender profiling practices and policies. These multiple methods can offer rich data that can allow verification and generalization. Data Collection Methods The researcher will conduct a pre-testing for all questionnaires first on two police officers and a criminology professor. Their comments and suggestions on validity and reliability will improve these questionnaires. Afterwards, the researcher will contact the local police head for the approval of the survey and the questionnaire. Random sampling will be applied where the researcher randomly chooses 20 to 30 police officers. The number will depend on those who are willing to participate in the study. The survey will be pen-and-paper, although an online survey may be applied if computers are available in the police station. The survey will be done during the most convenient time for the police, although they will be reminded to answer it during the time where they are not yet too tired or too stressed. In addition, the researcher will obtain the consent of a criminology professor for a semi-structured interview. The interview will be done in his/her office or any other convenient and comfortable place. The limitations of the data based on this research design pertain to sampling weakness and questionnaire validity, while advantages depend on the sampling and data collection methods. First, the advantages of quantitative survey data are their cost and time economy. They can also ensure that respondents are not forced to participate in the research. Second, the advantages of the qualitative data are that they can confirm the quantitative data through cross-reference within the same group. Secondary research and interview results can, moreover, improve the richness of the data in providing new directions for improving the validity and reliability of criminal profiling. Third, the disadvantages of survey questionnaire are that it may not capture nuanced information that can explain the data and some extraneous variables may affect its accuracy. Fourth, the disadvantages of secondary research are its lack of relevance for the respondents and too generalized results, while its advantages are providing theoretical bases that can explain the findings. Fifth, the disadvantages of interviews are poor external validity and the time needed to conduct it and to analyze results. Despite these advantages, the use of multiple measures can enhance the study’s validity and reliability through enriching data sources and providing opportunities for cross-verification and layering of data analyses. References Gravetter, F., & Forzano, L. (2012). Research methods for the behavioral sciences (4th ed.). California: Wadsworth. Maxfield, M., & Babbie, E. (2011). Research methods for criminal justice and criminology (7th ed.). California: ABC-CLIO. Noaks, L., & Wincup, E. (2004). Criminological research: Understanding qualitative methods. California: SAGE. Read More