High‐Stakes Administrative Discretion: What Drives Body‐Worn Camera Activations?

Abstract

Administrative discretion can range from benign to troubling, and law enforcement officers possess the power to use physical violence in the discharge of their duties. Body-worn cameras (BWCs) are a workplace surveillance technology intended to monitor officer behavior in the field, but officers exercise discretion over whether or not to activate their cameras. So, what drives officers to activate BWCs? Combining unique survey and administrative data, three competing explanations of BWC activation are compared in one department: Officer demographics, job function, and attitudes. Job function covariates offer robust predictive power of BWC activation frequency. Demographics do not predict BWC activations except rank, which negatively correlates with activation. Though the bulk of attitudinal measures do not predict BWC activations, negative relationships are noted with how officers perceive BWCs to impact their professional discretion, and their belief that cameras expose officers to public outrage and disapproval. Evidence for Practice• Job functions best explain activations of police BWCs. Clear-cut agency policy, such as mandating recording all public contacts, arrests, and probable use-of-force, will increase BWC activation. • Officers with sharper levels of concern that BWC's reduce their professional discretion, or expose them to public hatred and outrage, are likely to activate the cameras less often. • To the extent possible, public safety administrators should adopt model policies on BWC activation and communicate their support for difficult discretionary decision-making by frontline officers. • Nearly two-thirds of officers activate their camera more often than predicted by the best performing model. This indicates that BWC policy effectively sets a "floor" of minimum activation standards and that overall, officers will record more often than required.

Do body‐worn cameras reduce disparities in police behavior in minority communities? Evidence of nuanced influences across Black and Hispanic neighborhoods

“…BWC activation rates varied widely across individual officers in Anaheim, California, and were higher during violent crimes than during other types of incidents (Lawrence et al, 2019). Another study confirmed that BWC activation rates were largely driven by officer activity levels and job-related functions, above and beyond officers' demographic characteristics or attitudes toward BWCs (Adams et al, 2021). Researchers have also identified a pronounced influence of organizational policy on activation compliance, with more restrictive policies substantially increasing BWC activation in the field (Katz & Huff, in, press).…”

“…It is important to note that many incidents did not involve officers who were assigned to wear a BWC, contributing to the low percentage of incidents involving BWC activation (17.4%), which should not be considered indicative of low activation compliance (activation compliance was approximately 70% for officers assigned to wear BWCs; Katz & Huff, in press). The use of a direct measure of BWC activation should be considered a strength of the current study given prior research finding variation in activation compliance across officers (Adams et al., 2021; Lawrence et al., 2019) and varied impacts of BWCs on police behavior using measures of activation as opposed to assignment (Hedberg et al., 2017; Huff et al., 2020). Whether multiple BWCs were activated during an individual incident is also accounted for to address potential contamination.…”

“…Police officers have long been considered to have a "cover your ass" mentality to ensure continued employment (Van Maanen, 1978), and heightened national attention to police behavior and police reform have likely enhanced this orientation among officers who are feeling immense scrutiny due to what some have called a legitimacy crisis in policing (Todak, 2017). For instance, recent research has identified high rates of police turnover following protests related to the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, a fatal police use of force incident captured using a BWC (Mourtgos et al, 2021). As such, a combination of current sentiment toward the police and additional scrutiny facilitated by BWCs could change the way officers behave.…”

Police Uses of Force in the USA: a Wealth of Theories and a Lack of Evidence

“…Another potentially fruitful area of research on supervision comes from the body-worn camera literature (Adams et al, 2021 ; see Lum et al, 2019 for a review of body-worn camera research). Arguments for body-worn cameras typically claim that cameras can increase supervision because supervisors can review footage of police officers performing daily duties (Stoughton, 2018 ).…”

Branding, Value‐Signaling, and Nudging: When Push Comes to Shove

“…The development of this subtype of discretion helps to better analyze and perform it, while simultaneously nuancing the potential positive outcomes of creative uses of discretion for public service provision. Adams, Mourtgos and Mastracci (2021) ask what drives officers to activate body‐worn cameras? Combining survey and administrative data, three competing explanations of body‐worn cameras activation are compared in one department: officer demographics, job function, and attitudes.…”