TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2015//
TI  - Optimising the length of random breath tests: results from the Queensland Community Engagement Trial
JO  - Australian and New Zealand journal of criminology
A1  - Mazerolle, Lorraine
A1  - Bates, Lyndel
A1  - Bennett, Sarah
A1  - White, Gentry
A1  - Ferris, Jason
A1  - Antrobus, Emma
SP  - 256
EP  - 276
VL  - 48
IS  - 2
N2  - Research suggests that the length and quality of police-citizen encounters affect policing outcomes. The Koper Curve, for example, shows that the optimal length for police presence in hot spots is between 14 and 15 minutes, with diminishing returns observed thereafter. Our study, using data from the Queensland Community Engagement Trial (QCET), examines the impact of encounter length on citizen perceptions of police performance. QCET involved a randomised field trial, where 60 random breath test (RBT) traffic stop operations were randomly allocated to an experimental condition involving a procedurally just encounter or a business-as-usual control condition. Our results show that the optimal length of time for procedurally just encounters during RBT traffic stops is just less than 2 minutes. We show, therefore, that it is important to encourage and facilitate positive police-citizen encounters during RBT at traffic stops, while ensuring that the length of these interactions does not pass a point of diminishing returns.<p />  <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 0004-8658
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0004865814532661
ID  - ref1
ER  -