NCJ Number
85083
Date Published
1981
Length
47 pages
Annotation
The current police code of ethics tends to produce anomie and cognitive dissonance in police officers, because the code is not generally practical in the real situations confronting officers, so modifications are required to make the implementation of the code a possibility in the real world of policing.
Abstract
Anomie, as portrayed by Merton, is the result of the conceptual dichotomy between cultural goals and institutional means to achieve these goals. Anomie arises when the equilibrium between cultural goals and societal means of achieving these goals is upset. When the concept of anomie is applied to ethics in policing, anomie occurs when officers find it impossible to conform to the code under the structure and demands of their job situation. Anomie will result in one or a combination of the following officer adaptations: (1) conformity to institutional means for achieving ethical behavior, believing the code is thereby met; (2) innovating individual means for applying the code of ethics apart from the accepted institutional means; (3) scaling down ethical aspirations; (4) rejecting both the code of ethics and the institutional means for achieving it; and (5) substituting new standards and means for behavior that do not accord with either the code or the institutional means prescribed. Cognitive dissonance, as identified by Festinger, is a 'motivational state which exists when an individual's cognitive elements (attitudes, perceived behaviors) are inconsistent with each other.' Cognitive dissonance occurs in police officers when the attitudes and perceptions cultivated by the peer environment do not accord with the code of ethics taught in training. Anomie and cognitive dissonance spawned by an unrealistic code of ethics can be reduced by making the code of ethics and the means for achieving it more practical and possible for the real situations encountered by police. Twenty-three references are provided.