Race and attitudes toward the police. Assessing the effects of watching "reality" police programs

Compared with Whites, African Americans generally have less positive attitudes toward the police (ATP) and this is most often attributed to the differential nature of citizen-police interaction experienced by Blacks and Whites. It has been suggested that the media play an important socializing role, in the form of "vicarious" police contacts, in generating ATP. To assess this possibility, this research examined the relationship between ATP and watching television news as well as "reality" crime programming, such as COPS and America's Most Wanted. Data used in these analyses were taken from a 1996 survey of 1,492 adults residing in a southeastern metropolitan area. When other factors influencing ATP were controlled for in ordinary least squares (OLS) regressions, the frequency of watching news was positively related to ATP for Blacks and Whites alike, but watching "reality" crime programming improved ATP only for Whites, males, and those with no college experience. "Reality" crime programming increased the racial divide in ATP.