An examination of the influence of procedurally just strategies on legal cynicism among urban youth experiencing police contact.

Adolescents experience more police-initiated contacts resulting from relatively minor infractions than any other group, and often these interactions do not result in notable legal consequences. However, such interactions may have long-term consequences for adolescent perceptions of the justice system. Using data from the age 15 wave of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study, our study examines associations between situational and process features of police contact and legal cynicism in adolescence, accounting for demographic characteristics, self-reported delinquency, neighborhood context, and stop outcome. Relative to youth who experienced only vicarious police contact, youth who had direct or both direct and vicarious police contact reported higher levels of legal cynicism. Youth perceptions of procedural justice were associated with lower legal cynicism. Situational features of police contact such as harsh language and frisking were related to higher legal cynicism. Directions for future research, including the need for longitudinal research on this topic, are discussed.

Police contact and health among urban adolescents: The role of perceived injustice.

This research evaluates whether personal and vicarious police contact are related to self and caregiver-reports of teen health and to what extent these associations vary by perceptions of procedural injustice. We analyzed longitudinal health data collected from adolescents in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 3435), alongside teen self-reports of whether they were stopped by the police or experienced vicarious police contact, and if so, their perceptions of procedural injustice in these encounters. We estimated regression models with lagged dependent variables and a propensity score weighting approach. Our analysis yielded four important results. First, participants who reported personal or vicarious police stops had worse self-reported health in adolescence than their counterparts with no contact. Second, both types of police contact were unrelated to caregiver reports of adolescent health and inconsistently related to somatic symptoms. Third, procedural injustice exacerbated the relationship between both personal and vicarious contact and diminished self-reported health. Finally, the associations between police contact and self-reported health were stronger among black and Hispanic adolescents than white ones. Our results highlight personal and vicarious police contact, particularly instances viewed as procedurally unjust, as commonly experienced adverse health events among urban adolescents.