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43 Policing: Int'l J. Police Strat. & Mgmt. 1 (2020)

handle is hein.journals/polic43 and id is 1 raw text is: 


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         Willingness to report crime

                             to the police

                Traditional crime, cybercrime,
                        and procedural justice

                                 Amanda Graham
                              School  of Criminal  Justice,
               Georgia  Southern  University,  Statesboro, Georgia,  USA
                                  Teresa C. Kulig
                     School  of Criminology  and  Criminal  Justice,
          University of Nebraska   at Omaha,   Omaha, Nebraska, USA, and
                                 Francis T. Cullen
    School  of Criminal  Justice, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati,  Ohio, USA

Abstract
Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to understand the reporting intentions of traditional and cybercrime
victimization, and the role of procedural justice in explaining sources of variation.
Design/methodology/approach  - Using Amazon's MTurk program for opt-in survey participation, 534
respondents across the USA considered ten victimization incidents and expressed their likelihood of reporting
each incident to the police as well as their belief that the police would identify and arrest the offender.
Findings - As  expected, reporting intentions increased with the seriousness of the incident for both
traditional crime and cybercrime. However, reporting intentions were generally slightly higher for incidents
that occurred in the physical world, as opposed to online. Likewise, beliefs that police could identify and arrest
and offender were lower for cybercrime compared to traditional crime. Consistently, predictors of reporting to
the police and belief in police effectiveness hinged heavily on procedural justice. Other predictors for these
behaviors and beliefs are also discussed.
Originality/value - This study uniquely compares reporting intentions of potential victims of parallel
victimizations occurring in-person and online, thus providing firm comparisons about reporting intentions
and beliefs about police effectiveness in addressing traditional and cybercrime.
Keywords  Cybercrime, Crime, Victimization, Reporting intentions
Paper type Research paper


From  memes   to music  and business  to banking, the internet has undoubtedly  changed
worldwide  human  social interaction. The internet's ubiquity is evidenced in its use by nine
out of ten Americans (Anderson  et al., 2019) and by the estimated 6.5 h per day the average
adult worldwide  spends  interacting online (Kemp, 2019). However, not all of this time is
spent  innocently watching  cat videos, sharing photos  from  a recent vacation, seeking
romantic partners or paying bills. More wayward  internet users have used this medium for
nefarious purposes  -  to commit  cybercrime.  Indeed, a collateral consequence  of the
internet's invention and integration into our social and economic life is the creation of the
opportunity for cyber-victimization.
   Defined  as any crime that is facilitated or committed using a computer, network,  or
hardware  device, the absolute prevalence of cybercrime in America is unknown   (Gordon
and  Ford, 2006, p. 14). For example, the Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) Internet
Crime  Complaint Center, which receives complaints about  internet crime, reported 301,580
complaints  of people victimized in 2017, totaling $1.42bn in losses (FBI, 2018). Some of
the most  prevalent complaints were  non-payment/non-delivery   (84,079 victims), personal
data breach  (30,904 victims) and  phishing/vishing/smishing/pharming (25,344   victims).


Willingness to
   report  crime
   to the  police


1


   Recived 24 July 2019
Revised 21 September 2019
Acepted 29 Ocober 2019


Policing: An InterationalJournal
        Vol. 43 No. 1, 2020
              pp. 1-16
 C Emerald Publishing Limited
             1363951X
DOI 10.1108/PUPSM-07-20190115

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