Procedural Justice - Subject Follow-up
This measure appears in the following time-points: Follow06, Follow12, Follow18, Follow24, Follow30, Follow36, Follow48, Follow60, Follow72, Follow84.
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Related Construct
Description of Measure
The Procedural Justice inventory was adapted for this study to measure the adolescent's perception of fairness and equity connected with arrest and court processing. The approach taken here was an adaptation of those taken by Tyler (1997). Conceptually, the idea is that there is an experiential basis for translating interactions with legal processes into perceptions and evaluations of the law and the legal actors that enforce it. This measure is designed to tap several dimensions of fair treatment: correctability, ethicality, representativeness and consistency (see Tyler and Huo, 2002). The outcomes of this process include evaluations of law and its underlying norms: legitimacy and legal cynicism.
The 55 items in this measure are divided into four sections: Police {Direct Experience & Others' Experience (e.g., "The police treat me the same way they treat most people my age.")}, Judge {Direct Experience & Others' Experience (e.g., "The court considered the evidence/viewpoints in this incident fairly.")}, Legitimacy (e.g., "I feel people should support the police."), and Legal Cynicism (e.g., "Laws are meant to be broken.").
A one-factor CFA was conducted for each of the scores generated below at the baseline time point. The values produced from this analysis are as follows:
- Procedural justice scales for police - direct experience (alpha: 74; NFI: .79; NNFI: .78; CFI: .81; RMSEA: .08. A second model which dropped 2 items from the scale was also fit to the data; however, the working group agreed that nothing was gained by the dropping the two items. The one-factor model using all items is the one kept in the data set, although these fit statistics indicate only marginal fit)
- Procedural justice scales for police - others experience (alpha: 57; NFI: .96; NNFI: .93; CFI: .97; RMSEA: .06.)
- Procedural justice scales in court - direct experience (alpha: 75; NFI: .80; NNFI: .78; CFI: .82; RMSEA: .07. A second model which dropped 2 items from the scale was also fit to the data; however, this model offered little advantage and the model with the full item set was kept in the data set. Again, the fit statistics below indicate only marginal fit.
- Procedural justice scales in court - others experience (alpha: 66; NFI: .93; NNFI: .90; CFI: .94; RMSEA: .08).
- Legitimacy index (alpha: 80; NFI: .91; NNFI: .90; CFI: .92; RMSEA: .07).
- Legal cynicism index (alpha: .60; NFI: .98; NNFI: .98; CFI: .99; RMSEA: ,03).
There was also found to be adequate internal consistency at the follow-up time points. The alphas for these scales for 6 through 84 months are as follows:
Summary procedural justice indices for police [S#PJCOP] Cronbach's alpha follow-up: 6-months: .77, 12- months: .77, 18-months: .78, 24 –months: .76, 30-months: .75, 36-months: .74, 48-months: .74, 60-months: .81, 72-months: .81, 84-months: .81
Procedural justice scales for police - direct experience [S#PJCOPU] Cronbach's alpha follow-up: 6-months: .73, 12- months: .74, 18-months: .74, 24 –months: .74, 30-months: .75, 36-months: .74, 48-months: .72, 60-months: .78, 72-months: .79, 84-months: .80
Procedural justice scales for police - others experience [S#PJCOPO] Cronbach's alpha follow-up: 6-months: .58, 12- months: .64, 18-months: .68, 24 –months: .67, 30-months: .71, 36-months: .71, 48-months: .68, 60-months: .71, 72-months: .71, 84-months: .71
Summary procedural justice indices for judges [S#PJJUDG] Cronbach's alpha follow-up: 6-months: .78, 12- months: .78, 18-months: .79, 24 –months: .77, 30-months: .80, 36-months: .80, 48-months: .78, 60-months: .81, 72-months: .78, 84-months: .80
Procedural justice scales for court - direct experience [S#PJJUDU] Cronbach's alpha follow-up: 6-months: .76, 12- months: .77, 18-months: .77, 24 –months: .74, 30-months: .77, 36-months: .76, 48-months: .73, 60-months: .79, 72-months: .77, 84-months: .76
Procedural justice scales for court - others experience [S#PJJUDO] Cronbach's alpha follow-up: 6-months: .64, 12- months: .70, 18-months: .67, 24 –months: .69, 30-months: .72, 36-months: .73, 48-months: .70, 60-months: .71, 72-months: .72, 84-months: .71
Legitimacy index [S#LEGIT] Cronbach's alpha follow-up: 6-months: .83, 12- months: .82, 18-months: .84, 24 –months: .85, 30-months: .84, 36-months: .86, 48-months: .86, 60-months: .86, 72-months: .88, 84-months: .87
Legal cynicism index [S#CYNIC] Cronbach's alpha follow-up: 6-months: .66, 12- months: .64, 18-months: .69, 24 –months: .70, 30-months: .71, 36-months: .72, 48-months: .72, 60-months: .70, 72-months: .72, 84-months: .73
Eight scores are computed:
- Summary procedural justice indices for police [S#PJCOP]. For the majority of cases, this will be computed as a mean of 19 items. If the subject has not had any contact with the police however, this will be computed as the mean of seven items.
- Procedural justice scales for police - direct experience [S#PJCOPU]. For the majority of cases, this will be computed as a mean of 14 items. If the subject has not had any contact with the police, this will be computed as the mean of only two items.
- Procedural justice scales for police - others experience [S#PJCOPO]; mean of 5 items
- Summary procedural justice indices for judges [S#PJJUDG]. For the majority of cases, this will be computed as a mean of 19 items. If the subject has not had any contact with the courts, this will be computed as the mean of only seven items.
- Procedural justice scales for court - direct experience [S#PJJUDU]. For the majority of cases, this will be computed as a mean of 14 items. If the subject has not had any contact with the courts, this will be computed as the mean of only two items.
- Procedural justice scales for court - others experience [S#PJJUDO]; mean of 7 items
- Legitimacy index [S#LEGIT]; mean 11 items
- Legal cynicism index [S#CYNIC]; mean 5 items
The following individual items are also available:
- Police picked you up and accused you of something in the recall period [S#ProJus_PJPoli]
- Number of times police picked you up and accused you of something in the recall period [S#ProJus_PJPNum]
- Had a court appearance for something illegal you were accused of or up for review at placement in recall period [S#ProJus_PJCrt]
- Number of times had court appearance for something accused of/up for review at placement in recall period [S#ProJus_PJCNum]
Data Issues
- In the Procedural Justice section of the interview there is an item which asks about being picked up by the police (S#ProJus_PJPoli) which is similar to an item asked in the Legal Calendar (S#LegCal_Pickedup). The item in the Procedural Justice section is slightly different in that it adds the requirement that the subject be accused of something. Because of this difference in wording, there may not be an exact match between these two variables.
- A response of No to S#ProJus_PJPoli will cause 12 questions that are logically linked to the above question to be skipped. All of these items are used in the computation of s#pjcop and s#pjcopu. Depending on the mix of endorsed items, the summary scores may represent less than the total items.
- If the subject has had prior contact with the police, s#pjcop is computed as the mean of 19 items. If no prior contact, this is computed as the mean of only seven items.
- If the subject has had prior contact with the police, s#pjcopu is computed as the mean of 14 items. If no prior contact, this is computed as the mean of only two items.
- A response of No to S#ProJus_PJCrt will cause 12 different items that are logically linked to this question to be skipped. This affects two summary scores.
- If the subject has had prior contact with the courts, s#pjjudg is computed as the mean of 19 items. Otherwise, this is computed as the mean of only seven items.
- If the subject has had prior contact with the courts, s#pjjudu is computed as the mean of 14 items. Otherwise, this is computed as the mean of only two items.
References
- Casper, J., Tyler, T., and Fisher, B. (1988). Procedural justice in felony cases. Law and Society Review, 22(3) 483-507.
- Tyler, T.R. (1990). Why People Obey the Law. New Haven: Yale University Press.
- Tyler, T. (1997). Procedural fairness and compliance with the law. Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics, 133 (2/2), 219-240.
- Paternoster, R., Brame, R., Bachman, R., and Sherman, L.W. (1997). Do fair procedures matter? The effect of procedural justice on spouse assault. Law and Society Review, 31, 163-204.
- Srole, L. (1956). Social integration and certain corollaries: An exploratory study. American Sociological Review, 21, 709-716.
- Sampson, R.J. and Bartusch, D.J. (1999). Legal cynicism and tolerance of deviance: the neighborhood context of racial differences. Law and Society Review, 32(4), 777-804.