Criminology Commons^™

Willingness To Speak In The Context Of Police Use Of Force, Rachel Italiano

Master's Theses (2009 -)

Police use of force has become a common phrase in the current United States society, especially in the context of law enforcement encounters with Black men. However, even with extensive media coverage of protests and incidents between police and Blacks, not much is known about peoples’ willingness to speak out about the topic. Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann’s spiral of silence theory, which states that peoples’ perceptions of others and media exposure is largely responsible for determining an individual’s willingness to speak, is uniquely positioned to examine this topic. This study utilized a Qualtrics panel of 905 participants and a questionnaire to examine …