Police Uniforms Research Articles

What are the most important components of a police uniform? Qualitative insight from a sample of Canadians

ABSTRACT Uniforms are an important element of policing. Manipulations to police uniforms, including via the addition, removal and/or alteration of equipment, can impact public perceptions of officers. As part of the present research, we sought to qualitatively assess how the public interpret police uniforms. We asked a large sample of Canadians (N = 1,997) to freeform describe what they believed to be the most important components of a police uniform. Using a detailed codebook, we then coded participants’ responses to identify patterns. Among the themes identified, participants most frequently referenced equipment and presentation as well as institutional recognition as the most important components of a police uniform. Participants also frequently referenced the functionality of the uniform as well as its image. We discuss our results in the context of policing research and practice.

The power of uniforms to change your community relationships

For years, I can remember that police uniforms, regardless of the municipality, all looked similar. Campus police and public safety officers also took to wearing that type and style of uniform, and it helped make the transition from campus security guards.

Situational context and public perceptions of officer appearance: A vignette-based study of police uniforms and accouterments

Previous research has documented the effects of uniforms and accouterments on public perceptions of police in acontextual settings. Drawing upon a vignette-based survey, we explored the perceptual effects of various police uniforms and accouterments in the context of five different policing environments: (1) a burglary where the suspect was present, (2) a burglary where the suspect was not present, (3) a foot patrol, (4) a roadblock, and (5) a siege involving a barricaded person. As part of our research design, a sample of Queensland adults ( N = 292) rated images of police officers from the Queensland Police Service in different aesthetic capacities in each aforementioned environment along three perceptual outcomes: (1) traits, (2) effectiveness, and (3) procedural justice. The analyses reveal that appearance manipulations can impact public perceptions of officers. The analyses also indicate that the effects of some manipulations can sometimes vary by situational context. We discuss our results with respect to past and future research as well as operational policing practices.

The impact of police uniforms in changing views of police legitimacy and driving intentions among young people: an experimental trial

Abstract Objectives This study aimed to determine if young people’s views of police legitimacy and intentions to offend are affected by the delivery of a road safety program by uniformed police officers (control) compared with plain clothes police officers (experimental). The study further explores the direct correlation between views of police legitimacy and intentions to offend as well as the impact of uniforms, mediated by views of police legitimacy, on intentions to offend. Methods Participants in this study were grade 12 students (n = 380) from private (fee-paying) high schools located in Queensland, Australia. Participants were surveyed following their involvement in a police road safety program. t-Tests, correlation, and mediation analyses were conducted to determine the impact of police uniforms and views of police legitimacy on intentions to offend. Results Results of this study demonstrate that delivery of the program by uniformed police officers had a significantly greater positive impact on the views of police legitimacy and intentions to offend compared with delivery by plain-clothed officers. The study also demonstrates a significant correlation between views of police legitimacy and intentions to offend, as well as a mediated model including views of police legitimacy that explains more variance in intentions to offend when mediated by views of police legitimacy. Conclusions This study demonstrates that views of police legitimacy, as well as intentions to offend, are more positively impacted when an educational course is facilitated by uniformed police officers. The mediation analysis demonstrates that uniforms impact views of police legitimacy and these views significantly affect intentions to offend. The findings of this study provide valuable insights into the complex relationship between police uniforms, views of police legitimacy, and offending and may inform future research and policy decisions in the area of policing.

In the eye of the powerholder: examining the relationship between uniform and accoutrement combinations and police self-legitimacy

ABSTRACT Scholars and police organizations argue that when police officers don a uniform, they imbue a certificate of legitimacy. In our study of 238 police officers, we test the assumption that the police uniform impacts officers’ beliefs about their own legitimacy, and, in turn, their projected behavior when in uniform. We find that, when comparing across various combinations of uniforms and accoutrements, officers in our study tended to prefer their standard uniform as a legitimating device. Moreover, we find that the legitimacy attributed to the standard uniform can impact officers’ willingness to engage in certain behaviors when in uniform, at least for the female officers in our sample. This research supports the important role of officer appearance in shaping police perceptions and behaviors, complementing existing research that examines citizens’ perceptions of police uniforms and accoutrements.

Garment sizing system development for Amhara policemen uniforms using data mining techniques

Purpose Sizing system is a fundamental topic in garment fitting. The purpose of this study was to assess the fit of existing police uniforms (shirt, jacket, overcoat and trousers) and develop a sizing system for upper and lower body uniforms of Amhara policemen in Ethiopia. Design/methodology/approach In total, 35 body dimensions of 889 policemen were taken through a manual anthropometric survey following the procedures in ISO 8559:1989 after each subject was interviewed on issues related to garment fit. The anthropometric data were pre-processed, key body dimensions were identified by principal components analysis and body types were clustered by the agglomerative hierarchical clustering algorithm and verified by the XGBoost classifier in a Python programming environment. The developed size charts were validated statistically using aggregate loss and accommodation rate. Findings About 44% of the subjects encountered fit problems every time they own new readymade uniforms. Lengths and side seams of shirts, and lengths and waist girths of trousers are the most frequently altered garment sites. Analysis of the anthropometric measurements resulted in 13 and 15 sizes for the upper and lower bodies, respectively. Moreover, the comparison of the developed upper garment size chart with the existing size chart for a shirt showed a considerable difference. This indicates that inappropriate size charts create fit problems. Originality/value The study considers the analysis of fit problems and sizing system development in a less researched country. Moreover, the proposed data mining procedure and its application for size chart development is unique and workable.

Comparative study of Brazilian Military Police Uniforms

Although there are literature studies on military uniforms, few investigate those used by the Military Police (MP). As such, the present study aimed to characterize the structural, colorimetric and mechanical properties of Brazilian MP Uniforms. To that end, yarn count, fabric weight, yarn density, weave pattern, optical microscopy, fastness, reflectance spectrophotometry and tensile strength tests were performed on uniforms from MPMG, MPSC and MPRN (Military Police from the states of Minas Gerais, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Norte, respectively). Structural similarities between the MPMG and MPSC uniforms were detected, and significant differences in relation to the MPRN. The three uniforms displayed satisfactory performance in dry rubbing fastness, and unsatisfactory in wet rubbing fastness and loss of color after washing. Thus, there is significant room for improvement in military police uniforms in Brazil.

Quarter-Life Crises of Police Officers in Baguio City Police Office

Not all heroes wear capes. You can see some of them in police uniforms, managing the traffic flows, maintaining peace and order, and protecting the innocent lives of everyone. However, our modern heroes also had to deal with struggles to develop stronger and better characters. This paper deals with the findings on the professional crises experienced by the Baguio City Police Officers. The study’s main objective is to explore the quarter-life crises of Police Officers in Baguio City Police Office and how it affects their work performance. This study has used a qualitative research method through an interpretative phenomenological research design. The key informants of this research were twenty (20) police officers aged 25-30 years old in Baguio City Police Station. The major instrument used for data collection was an interview guide. Using the axial coding technique, the related data revealed codes, categories, and subcategories grounded within the participants’ experiences. The findings revealed that the professional crises experienced by police officers include organizational workload, lack of work-life balance, conflict of ideas, superiority complex, police-citizen encounters, and financial problems. Moreover, the above-mentioned have led them to low morale, low self-esteem, mental strain, weakened police-community ties, career disappointment, poor work performance, and inconsistent sleeping and eating routines.

Automated uniform recognition to enhance video surveillance at correctional services in South Africa

Injuries from inmate altercations are common in correctional service facilities. Monitoring incidents manually from video surveillance can be challenging. Computer vision has the potential to assist security personnel in securing facilities. This work compares two methods for recognising occupational uniforms with the aim of improving situational awareness and safety in prisons. The first method uses histograms of hue and saturation (HS) colour-space features and a shallow learning classifier. The second method uses convolutional neural network (CNN) models trained with either hand-engineered or automatically learned features. A training dataset with civilians, South African correctional service and police uniforms was created. The experimental results demonstrate comparable performance from shallow learning algorithms and CNN models. Machine learning algorithms evaluated on the proposed colour features achieved an average balanced performance (F1-score) of 0.85 and inference times range from 0.01 to 4.9 milliseconds.

‘Wait! Don’t touch me!’: Police uniforms, family anxiety, and rituals of purification in the COVID-19 pandemic

ABSTRACT Emblematic power is entrenched in the uniform and bodily image of the police. The COVID-19 pandemic has afforded a new layer of understandings of ‘dirty work’ with police officers, and has shown how the police uniform is perceived to be an involuntary vehicle for physical contamination and symbolic taint. This article is based on interviews with 18 police officers from 11 UK police forces over the summer of 2020 and explores how the COVID-19 pandemic caused increased fear and anxiety about virus contraction, particularly when officers were not prioritised for testing and vaccinations at the time. The possibility of transmitting COVID-19 to family members motivated officers to treat their uniforms differently, and they undertook purification rituals to mitigate violations of the physical and symbolic space around the body. Fear and anxiety of ‘the unknown’ is a motivator for discussions about long-term effects of officer well-being, and the significance of learning to prepare for future pandemics.

Visible policing: uniforms and the (re)construction of police occupational identity

ABSTRACT This article contributes to contemporary criminological debates on police visibility by exploring the relationship between police uniforms, artefacts and occupational identity. The article is influenced by visual criminology and semiotics and draws on elicitation interviews with officers and staff from four English police services. Participants were asked to bring with them an object or image that they identified as being an important expression of their occupational identity, which was then discussed. Most often objects or images were associated with their uniform. Findings are presented in relation to the visual symbolism, iconography and performativity of uniforms and related material artefacts. Participants drew upon visual representations in making sense of positive and negative aspects of their role and in defending their occupational identity in the light of perceived external challenges, such as reductions in police numbers and threats of violence and danger. It is argued that the communicative properties of this material culture play an important symbolic role in the self-legitimation and professional identity of police work.

The thin blue line between cop and soldier: examining public perceptions of the militarized appearance of police

ABSTRACT Research suggests that certain characteristics of police uniforms and equipment influence how the public perceives police officers. The current study expanded on this research by examining how various features related to police militarism (e.g., weaponry) are perceived by the public. Approximately 2000 community members from across Canada were shown a series of photographs of officers that were manipulated to alter their attire and armament. Participants rated each officer on: (1) personal qualities, (2) skills they likely possess or behaviours they are likely to exhibit, and (3) behavioural intentions on the participant’s part towards the officers. Findings suggest that the public harbours significant negative perceptions of certain officers donning militarized attire with regards to approachability, trust, and morality, among other qualities. However, these officers are also perceived to be stronger, confident, and more prepared for threatening behaviour/dangerous situations. Given current trends toward equipping officers with tools to deal with emerging threats, public judgments based on officer appearance have important implications for community relations and officer safety.

Statistical Analysis of Standard Allowed Minute on Sewing Efficiency in Apparel Industry

Abstract Apparel industry is not only one of the oldest, largest, labor-intensive, and most global industries but also the typical “starter” industry for countries engaged in export-orientated industrialization. To achieve such dreams, the industry has looked over different inter-dependable factors while producing different products. In this study, an effort has been made to establish a correlation between standard allowed minutes (SAMs) and efficiency of sewing section using different variables, including production rate, number of workstations, and operation breakdown, having a differential impact on both the selected variables. All the empirical analyses were planned in a vertically integrated textile company called Almeda Textile Private Limited Company (PLC), Ethiopia, starting from the basic product category (such as V-neck shirt) up to complicated workwear including military clothing and federal police uniforms of Ethiopia. The Pearson correlation coefficient method was chosen to find the relationship between bivariate linearly scaled variables using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) software. The expected outcome will help in identifying the type of correlation and its significant level as well as its impact on the overall productivity of the sewing section which eventually leads to fulfilling the mission of attaining sustainable production capacity of the mentioned vertically integrated manufacturing company.

Police Cars and Indigenous Cultural Designs: A Semiotic Analysis

In recent years, police agencies have adopted Indigenous cultural designs on police vehicles and uniforms. In 2017, the Western Australia Police unveiled police vehicles branded with Indigenous cultural designs as part of an initiative that aimed to strengthen relationships with the Aboriginal community. This article analyzed one of these vehicles using semiotic analysis. Our analysis shows how the vehicle serves as a sign of symbolic violence and how the unification of “police” and “indigeneity” works to create an amalgam of new meaning, which neutralizes historical and contemporary actualities. We discuss how the initiative keeps structural issues intact and question whether it can be read as a self-interest mechanism of dominant culture rather than a genuine desire to help Aboriginal communities.

Skirts, Stereotypes, and Silences: Representations of Women in Canadian Police Museums

Drawing from interviews, fieldnotes, and visual data, we examine representations of policewomen and gender communicated in Canadian police museums. We examine four trends from our dataset. First, we found silences regarding the history of women in policing in Canada. Second, there was a fetish-like emphasis on women’s police uniforms. Third, when included policewomen were treated in a tokenistic manner. By contrast, displays focusing on men treated them as policing heroes. We argue the history of policing may be one of white male domination, but this facet of social control should not be further normalized by erasing important elements of the histories of women from police museums. In the discussion, we explain what this analysis adds to literatures on representations of women in museums and on representations of policing.

지역경찰의 근무복 및 방탄 · 방검복 개선을 위한 실태조사

지역경찰의 근무복 및 방탄 · 방검복 개선을 위한 실태조사

한국 근대 양복점의 판매 물품과 생산 및 판매 주체

This study examined the types and characteristics of products that were sold at tailor shops in Korea from the 1890s to 1945, and explored the types of economic subjects related to the tailor shops and their main activities. The study was conducted by a literature analysis based on newspaper data. In the 1890s, clothes required by government offices were sold mainly in tailor shops, such as western formal wears, military uniforms, and police uniforms. In the 1900s and 1910s, the production and delivery of government uniforms became more popular. In the 1920s, main items sold at tailor shops were general clothes, such as men’s suit and outerwear, and there were a wide variety of product types. Also, sales of ready-to-wear clothing expanded greatly during this period. In the 1930s, dressmaker’s shop for women became popular. From 1938 to 1945, it was difficult for tailors to run a normal business under the wartime emergency economic system. Economic subjects who worked for the tailor shop included the owner, the chief, the clerk, the salesperson, the workers, and the apprentices. The owner was classified into two types: a tailor who made his own suits and a non-tailor. The chief was assumed to be the tailor who had the most seniority. The clerk worked as an employee of the shop. Among the clerks, the salesperson was dispatched to the outside, made an order, and received a payment. The worker was a producer who was in charge of the production of clothes. Among the workers, there were apprentices who were trained in tailoring and sewing.

Students Wearing Police Uniforms Exhibit Biased Attention toward Individuals Wearing Hoodies.

Police provide an essential public service and they often operate in difficult circumstances, requiring high-speed cognition. Recent incidents involving apparent profiling and aggressive behavior have led to accusations that the police are sometimes biased. Given that previous research has shown a link between clothing and cognition, we investigated the question of whether the police uniform itself might induce a bias in social attention. To address this question, and using a Canadian university student sample, we assessed whether wearing a police uniform biases attention toward black faces compared to white faces, and low-status individuals compared to high-status individuals. In Experiment 1 (n = 28), participants wore either a police-style uniform or mechanic overalls, and performed a shape categorization task in the presence of a distractor that could be either: a black face, a white face, a person wearing a hoodie (whom we propose will be associated with low SES), or a person wearing a suit (whom we propose will be associated with high SES). Participants wearing the police-style uniform exhibited biased attention, indexed by slower reaction times (RTs), in the presence of low-SES images. In Experiment 2 (n = 28), we confirmed this bias using a modified Dot-Probe task – an alternate measure of attentional bias in which we observed faster RTs to a dot probe that was spatially aligned with a low SES image. Experiment 3 (n = 56) demonstrated that attentional bias toward low-SES targets appears only when participants wear the police-style uniform, and not when they are simply exposed to it – by having it placed on the desk in front of them. Our results demonstrate that wearing a police-style uniform biases attention toward low-SES targets. Thus, wearing a police-style uniform may induce a kind of “status-profiling” in which individuals from low-status groups become salient and capture attention. We note that our results are limited to university students and that it will be important to extend them to members of the community and law-enforcement officers. We discuss how uniforms might exert their effects on cognition by virtue of the power and cultural associations they evoke in the wearer.

조선총독부 경찰복제도 연구

The purpose of this study is to reveal the process of enactment and revision, the contents of the police uniform system by the Government-General of Joseon, and to examine the relationship be-tween the uniform system and the ruling policies of Imperialist Japan. The research methodology in-volved document research of official gazettes that published legislation on the police uniform system. Political background was referenced from various preceding studies. The research results are as follows. The Japanese invasion of Korea, in regards to the police, appeared as infiltrations through the three routes of consular police, temporary military police, and inside the Korean police. Each or-ganization had different uniform systems, and after the installation of the Japanese police in 1907, the uniform system of high level officers of the Korea police was changed to the Japanese-style. After the installation of the Government-General of Joseon in 1910, a police uniform system was not enact-ed until 1918, with the exception being made for police officers due to the military police system. The ‘Police Officer Uniform System of the Government-General of Joseon’ enacted in 1918 stood out for its golden insignia on solidly colored fabric, which effectively indicated rank, as well as the Japanese flag pattern and the cherry blossom pattern, which symbolized imperialist Japan, on the cap badge and insignia. The 1918 uniform system had many differences from the Japanese system of the time in terms of design, perhaps due to the political autonomy of the governor-general. The 1918 uniform system was completely revised in 1932. This uniform system was modified in various ways. The system was almost identical to the Japanese system at that time. This is the result of Japan’s in-tent to dominate Korea, which involved assimilating Korea into Japan with the purpose of conducting a full-fledged invasion of the continent after the Manchurian Incident.Key words: regulations of police uniforms( ), the Government-General of Joseon( ), the ruling policies of Imperialist Japan( ), uniforms()

How I Discovered Poetry by Marilyn Nelson (review)

Reviewed by: How I Discovered Poetry by Marilyn Nelson Deborah Stevenson Nelson, Marilyn. How I Discovered Poetry; illus. by Hadley Hooper. Dial, 2014. [112p]. ISBN 978-0-8037-3304-6 $16.99 Reviewed from galleys R* Gr. 7-12. This slender verse memoir draws on both previously published and new work to paint “a portrait of the artist as a young American Negro girl,” following young Marilyn from 1950 to 1959, age four to thirteen. The nearly fifty poems (each subtitled with location and date) offer snapshots of her life with her family as they followed a peripatetic Army existence, moving from place to place as her father, a high-ranking officer, changed postings and her mother found new teaching jobs. Her family were often the “First Negroes” for townies and classmates, but they nonetheless generally rooted into each new place, Marilyn finding solid friends and excelling academically. Notes of the era are effectively played as young Marilyn imagines fighting the Red Menace and absorbs adult commentary about “that lady in Montgomery” and “a boy named Emmett.” The tightly written yet musing poems (many of them unrhymed sonnets) effectively capture single moments as slices of a larger, longer trajectory of growth, travel, and inquiry. Young Marilyn’s capable, confident family (“Daddy corrects white men who call him boy./ Even when they’re in police uniforms”) provides a solid foundation for both her and the narrative trajectory, and her need to find herself over and over again in each new location provides an unusual opportunity for self-awareness and reflection that understandably translates into becoming a poet. Attractive and subtle design adds appeal, with poem titles in slate blue and simple decorative spot art, usually dichromatic, neatly supplying both a retro visual quotation and contemporary currency; [End Page 370] occasional family photographs provide additional immediacy. Use this to bring a vivid personal touch to an exploration of the era, or as a gloriously personal entry in a poetry unit that will prompt eager imitation. Final illustrations not seen. Copyright © 2014 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois