Study title

England

Group

Data collection methods included: (1) individual questionnaires containing approval / disapproval ratings, age, gender and ethnic composition of each focus group and (2) video–clips displaying police–public encounters, discussed by focus groups.Methodology in detail: 5 episodes of routine, but problematic police–public encounters were extracted from broadcast BBC documentaries on policing and a licence obtained from the BBC to use the extract for research purposes. These were then displayed one at a time to a diverse array of focus groups selected from across the ‘Black Country’ region of the West Midlands to maximize representation of neighborhood, age, gender, and ethnic composition. Each focus group participant completed a brief questionnaire asking for their approval / disapproval rating of police behavior in each clip before and after the discussion was held, plus any free text comments. The discussions were recorded on digital audio files (.wma). A total of 39 focus groups were held, 34 of which were deemed useful for analysis (two were pilot groups, two more were demonstrations held at the annual conference of the British Criminology Society and one was a very small group of LGBT activists held at the University of Wolverhampton and considered too unrepresentative to prove helpful.The participants (entities under study) comprised younger and older people from across a range of ethnic minorities and lifestyles.