NCJ Number
139251
Journal
Journal of Criminal Justice Volume: 20 Issue: 5 Dated: (1992) Pages: 443-454
Date Published
1992
Length
12 pages
Annotation
Data have emerged since the mid-1970's to indicate that one-officer police patrols may be as effective as traditional two-officer police patrols.
Abstract
Research on investigations of one-officer police patrols has focused on patrol effectiveness, cost, safety, and patrol officer attitudes. Such research indicates that the manner in which patrol units are staffed affects a range of dependent variables. These variables include reasonably easy-to-measure indexes like cost, more-difficult-to-define variables such as unit performance, and hard-to-operationalize concepts like satisfaction and morale. At the broadest level, policing effectiveness appears to be the primary concern when deciding whether to use one-officer or two-officer police patrols. Officer safety is also a major variable that is influenced by police patrol staffing mode. Selection of the appropriate patrol staffing mode requires that dependent variables be defined and prioritized in a satisfactory way to all parties affected by the staffing decision (police officers on patrol, police administrators, and the public). Any decision needs to be monitored periodically to identify changing influences, such as changes in crime characteristics, city layout, and technology. 21 references