POSSE Research Methods & Evidence-Based Practice 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: In law enforcement research, what does the term 'statistical significance' indicate?
- The result is practically important for operations
- The finding is unlikely to be due to chance alone (Correct answer)
- The sample size was large enough
- The study was peer-reviewed
Correct answer: The finding is unlikely to be due to chance alone
Statistical significance means the probability that an observed result occurred by chance is below a set threshold (usually p < 0.05).
Question 2: Which research design best establishes a cause-and-effect relationship between a police intervention and crime reduction?
- Cross-sectional survey
- Case study
- Randomized controlled experiment (Correct answer)
- Descriptive analysis
Correct answer: Randomized controlled experiment
Randomized controlled experiments (RCTs) are the gold standard for establishing causation by randomly assigning subjects to treatment and control groups.
Question 3: A police department wants to evaluate whether body-worn cameras reduce use-of-force incidents. Which data source would be MOST directly useful?
- Officer satisfaction surveys
- Use-of-force incident reports before and after camera deployment (Correct answer)
- Community demographic data
- Department budget records
Correct answer: Use-of-force incident reports before and after camera deployment
Comparing use-of-force incident reports before and after camera deployment directly measures the outcome of interest.
Question 4: What is a 'control group' in a law enforcement experiment?
- Officers who supervise the experiment
- The group that receives the new intervention being tested
- The group that does not receive the intervention and serves as a baseline (Correct answer)
- A committee that reviews research ethics
Correct answer: The group that does not receive the intervention and serves as a baseline
The control group receives no intervention, providing a baseline against which to measure the effect of the treatment group's intervention.
Question 5: Which of the following is an example of quantitative data in a police study?
- Officers' personal descriptions of a foot chase
- Number of arrests per officer per month (Correct answer)
- Community members' feelings about policing
- A narrative account of a critical incident
Correct answer: Number of arrests per officer per month
Quantitative data consists of numerical measurements, such as arrest counts, that can be statistically analyzed.
Question 6: The 'Maryland Scale of Scientific Evidence' ranks studies primarily by their ability to:
- Attract research funding
- Control for threats to internal validity (Correct answer)
- Produce generalizable findings across countries
- Minimize research costs
Correct answer: Control for threats to internal validity
The Maryland Scale ranks study designs from 1 to 5 based on how well they control for confounding variables and threats to internal validity.
Question 7: When a researcher reviews all available studies on a topic and combines their findings, this process is called a:
- Literature review
- Systematic review and meta-analysis (Correct answer)
- Field experiment
- Replication study
Correct answer: Systematic review and meta-analysis
A systematic review and meta-analysis methodically combines findings from multiple studies to produce an overall estimate of effect.
POSSE Research Methods & Evidence-Based Practice 2
In law enforcement research, what does the term 'statistical significance' indicate?