The Public and the Justice System: Attitudes, Drivers and Behaviour - A Literature Review

4 Impact of attitudes on cooperation and compliance

Key Findings

• Procedural justice research has shown that when people feel that they are being treated fairly, neutrally, respectfully, that they are being allowed to have their say, and that they trust the motives of justice professionals, they are more likely to see their authority as legitimate, and comply and cooperate with justice professionals.
• There is also some evidence that those who see the justice system as legitimate are more likely to report crimes, though evidence is more mixed on this point.
• A modest link between perceived legitimacy of legal authorities and law abiding behaviour more generally has also been found.
• This link between perceived legitimacy and cooperation and compliance can differ across social groups such as between ethnic minority and majority groups.

Introduction

4.1 Before turning to consider how attitudes to the justice system can be improved, it is important to examine the evidence on the impact of attitudes to the justice system on people's behaviour. We will look in turn at three kinds of justice related behaviour, beginning with compliance and cooperation with police and court decisions.

Compliance and cooperation

4.2 In the previous section we looked at the evidence for the theory of procedural justice, which holds that a centrally important driver of attitudes to justice authorities (i.e. police or courts) is whether people believe or experience such authorities to be procedurally fair, that is, respectful, neutral, giving everyone their say, and with honest motives. It was found that perceived procedural justice can lead to improved satisfaction with legal authorities, trust and confidence in them, and a perception that the authority is legitimate i.e. a belief that the authority is entitled to be obeyed and should be deferred to (Jackson et al 2009, Sunshine & Tyler 2003, Tyler 2009, Myhill & Beak 2008, Gau 2010, Murphy et al 2006, Hough & Sato 2011).

4.3 Procedural justice theory, and research, does not however conclude with the impact of experience on attitudes, it also examines the impact of perceived legitimacy on people's behaviour, in terms of cooperation (i.e. assisting the authority) and compliance (i.e. obeying the authority).

4.3.1 This perceived legitimacy, therefore, makes people more likely to: accept the decisions of legal authorities, even when they are not personally desirable, comply with the authority's commands and requests for information, and generally cooperate with the authority when they encounter them (Jackson et al 2009, Sunshine & Tyler 2003, Tyler & Huo 2002, Myhill & Beak 2008, van Prooijen et al 2008, Skogan 2006, Gau 2010, Murphy et al 2006, Hough & Sato 2011; Hinds 2009). So, for example, McCluskey's study found that, controlling for other factors (including citizen characteristics), those receiving respectful treatment from police officers were found to be twice as likely to comply, those receiving disrespectful treatment were twice as likely to rebel, and where police politely discussed a situation, people were found to be more than twice as likely to comply with their requests (McCluskey 2003).

4.3.2 It should be noted that, in this literature, the evidence for a link between procedural justice and cooperation is stronger than the link with compliance, and that compliance is likely to be linked to other factors (such as compulsion or fear) in a way that cooperation is not.

4.3.3 It should also be noted that the relationship between perceived legitimacy and cooperation and compliance, while a statistically significant one, is likely also a small one (Gau 2011).

Crime reporting

4.4 The second kind of justice behaviour discussed in the literature is crime reporting (and subsequent witness activities) - a more proactive form of interaction with the police than the cooperation outlined above. The procedural justice literature does suggest that perceived legitimacy also leads to increased likelihood of crime reporting, but this is not as strong a finding as with immediate cooperation and compliance (see Jackson et al 2009 and Skogan 2006). The link between attitudes and crime reporting has, however, been explored elsewhere.

4.4.1 For example, Viki et al's study of intentions to report crime, provide witness statements and testify in court found that these intentions were significantly predicted by attitudes to the justice system (Viki et al 2006). It has also been found in the UK that confidence in both the police's willingness and capability to tackle serious ASB influenced non reporting of such incidents (Casey & Flint 2007). Conversely, a study in the US has found that willingness to report crime was not linked to perceptions of police effectiveness, but was linked to experience of the police, and perceptions of local community efficacy (Davis & Henderson 2003).

4.4.2 Finally, the SCJS asks victims of crime for the reason why they did or did not report the crime to the police. Of the responses from those who did not report the crime, three responses could be said to be related to attitudes to the justice system - the police would not have been interested (third largest response at 13%), previous bad experience of police or courts at 3%, and fear or dislike of the police at 1% (Scottish Government Social Research 2011: 63). Of the responses from those who did report the crime, only one response could be said to be related to attitudes to the justice system, but this was the top response at 50% - all crimes should be reported/right thing to do/duty/automatic (Ibid: 64). This response could be related to views on the legitimacy of the police's role to investigate crime, though more research would be needed to substantiate this link. It is interesting to note that there seem to be different reasons behind reasons to report than reasons not to report.

4.4.3 The evidence in regards to the impact of attitudes on crime reporting are therefore more mixed than with cooperation and compliance, though views on police's engagement/interest in the community, perceived legitimacy of police, and previous experience of police, may well be factors people consider when deciding whether to report a crime.

Obeying the law

4.5 The final type of justice related behaviour examined in the literature is obeying the law. Here we return to procedural justice research, which suggests that perceived legitimacy of legal authorities even has an impact on people's behaviour when the authorities are not present, in that people are generally more likely to abide by the law when they see those who uphold the law as legitimate (Jackson et al 2009, Sunshine & Tyler 2003, Tyler 2009, Moorhead et al 2008, Skogan 2006, Gau 2010, Tyler 2004, Hough & Sato 2011).

4.5.1 The theory can be explained thus - when people experience or view legal authorities as behaving fairly, they are more likely to identify with the legal authorities, see their actions as morally right, and the laws they enforce as consistent with their own values. People are therefore more likely to obey laws, as they see them as 'right' (see Tyler 2009). With this in mind, some proponents of procedural justice have contended that this could form the basis of a more efficient and effective way to achieve compliance with the law than traditional command and control or deterrence models, as people will self regulate rather than having to be sanctioned and threatened with sanction, in other words, coerced into compliance (see Jackson et al 2009, Sunshine & Tyler 2009, Gau 2010, Hough & Sato 2011).

4.5.2 This inverse of this effect potentially also holds, at least in some circumstances - for example Kane has found that indicators of compromised legitimacy of the police (incidents of misconduct and over-policing) in highly disadvantaged areas were predictive of variations in violent crime rates (Kane 2005). This relationship did not hold in less disadvantaged areas.

4.5.3 It is important, however, not to overstate the case here, and Moorhead et al concede that the link between legitimacy and law abiding behaviour exists, but emphasise that the effect size is 'modest' (Moorhead et al 2008).

4.5.4 We have seen, then, that links have been found between attitudes to the justice system and people's behaviour. Research shows that procedural justice leads to more cooperative and compliant behaviour when legal authorities interact with the public. It also suggests that positive attitudes may lead to more reporting of crime, and more law abiding behaviour in general. If this is indeed the case, clearly it is desirable to increase positive attitudes to the justice system among members of the public, especially perceptions of legitimacy.

Influence of social background

4.6 This relationship between perceived legitimacy and cooperation and compliance may not, however, apply to all groups within society. While research in the US has found that ethnicity does not influence procedural justice evaluations themselves, in that people of all demographics respond positively to procedural justice (see for example Tyler et al 2004; Higgins & Jordan 2005), this may not be the case with the effect of procedural justice evaluations on behaviour.

4.6.1 So, for example, Murphy and Cherney (2011) have found in Australia that the ethnicity of their survey respondents moderated the effect of procedural justice on willingness to cooperate with the police. That is, procedural justice had no effect on willingness to cooperate with the police among ethnic minority respondents, and in contrast, procedural justice significantly influenced willingness to cooperate with police amongst ethnic majority respondents (Murphy & Cherney 2011: 248).

4.6.2 In a separate Australian study, perceived legitimacy of the law (separate from the legitimacy of the police) was found to be relevant, and it was found that for ethnic minority respondents who questioned the legitimacy of the law, procedural justice had a negative effect on willingness to cooperate with the police (see Cherney & Murphy 2011).

4.6.3 Two theories have been used to illuminate these findings. First, the 'group value model' echoes some of the findings above in stating that experiencing procedural justice sends messages about a person's membership of the group represented by an authority, and good experiences foster support for the authority. However, some people in society will not identify as strongly as others with the 'dominant' group represented by legal authorities, and so for these people symbolic messages about group belonging are not as relevant or influential (see Murphy & Cherney 2011: 237).

4.6.4 The second theory is the theory of social distancing, which posits that people can take up a range of social distances in their interaction with authorities, ranging from commitment to disengagement. Experiences of procedural justice may have different outcomes for people with different social distances. For example, it may be particularly difficult to elicit positive responses from disengaged people, who have low levels of identification and trust, even when procedural justice is used (Cherney & Murphy 2011).

4.6.5 These findings and theories demonstrate that context can matter to the outcomes of procedural justice, depending on particular groups' relationships with dominant groups in society. The findings outlined here were in relation to ethnic groups, but this may apply to other kinds of marginalised groups in society.

4.6.6 Nonetheless, we have seen that, in at least some circumstances, procedural justice can lead to increased confidence, legitimacy, and increased willingness to cooperate and comply with legal authorities and the law. It should be noted that since the main focus of this review was on attitudes, and not behaviour, and given the small effect size of attitudes on compliance and behaviour, there has been no attempt to expand this section on cooperation and compliance beyond justice-related procedural justice literature, for example examining specific types of user experiences, or non-justice literature. There is therefore a wider literature that could be examined on this topic. The next and final section of this report will examine the evidence on what can improve public attitudes to the justice system.