Background: Rapid response is a fundamental policing strategy globally, making police response time a critical performance metric. This scoping review comprehensively maps and evaluates variables predicting police response time.
Methods: Our review includes English-language empirical studies with quantitative data linking the outcome variable, police response time, with predictors. We present both narrative and hybrid syntheses, a novel method for intricate quantitative datasets, bridging narrative and meta-analysis.
Results: After a meticulous search, screening, and selection process, 39 studies unveiled 630 associations between 122 predictor variables and police response time. We categorize these associations for clarity. Methodological steps and findings are available on this GitHub page.
Conclusions: Our conclusions and discussions focus on insights and recommendations for future research, acknowledging the challenge of definitively determining causal factors for police response time. We advocate mechanistic descriptions, emphasizing response time components, standardizing predictors and outcomes, and further exploring reporting time. We also present an initial causal model derived from observed predictor subcategories.
Keywords: police response time; scoping review; predictors; causal model
Within this repository, we provide an interactive Sankey diagram that presents the categories of predictors found in each study and against which component(s) of police response time the predictors variables within these categories were tested.
Access the interactive Sankey diagram: Sankey Diagram.
We also present a Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) that illustrates the causal relationships among predictor variables and their impact on police response time. This graphical representation provides a comprehensive view of the underlying factors.
The below flow chart visualizes the entire data collection process.
For in-depth insight into our methods and data, explore our registration: https://osf.io/hu2e9.
- Title: Predictors of olice response time: a scoping review
- Authors: Tim Verlaan, Stijn Ruiter
- Published: [Publication Date]
- Journal: Crime Science
- DOI: [DOI if available]