Assessing the Direct and Indirect Effects of Legitimacy on Public Empowerment of Police

Academic Journal Article Critique
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Introduction
Moule et al. (2019) conducted research evaluating legitimacy's direct and indirect impact on police public empowerment by focusing on the public support for law enforcement militarization in the United States (U.S.). The authors' qualifications indicate they are expert researchers on criminology and criminal justice issues, thus boosting the article's authenticity. The article's title is more than fifteen words; therefore, it is too long since the reader cannot capture the study's purpose. The abstract offers a concise overview of the article. It includes information about the research purpose, approach, sample size, results, conclusions, and implications for policy and theory. The reader can quickly establish that the article is of great significance and interest and thus continue reading it. The paper critiques Moule et al. (2019) article to demonstrate its robustness and authenticity and suggest areas for improvement.
Description of the Problem or Issue
The research purpose or problem is presented in the introduction part of the article. The authors first recognized the increased reliance on a process-based model of policing when studying community relations and public perspectives of law enforcement agencies. The problem is that although the process-based framework components have been evaluated and received tremendous support among Americans, some aspects of the model remain under-examined. This is particularly authentic concerning legitimacy implications. Police willingness to exercise discretion in law enforcement constitutes a legitimacy construct. Therefore, the researchers suggested a need to understand the public inclination to support police due to the increasingly visible and contentious misunderstandings between the law enforcement apparatus and the people they serve. One of the primary issues driving this divide is police militarization. The researchers examined police legitimacy's influence on American communities' willingness to support police militarization based on rational choice and cognitive psychology theories (Moule et al., 2019).
Analysis
The article is well-organized and demonstrates logical consistency. It demonstrates a clear connection between the steps starting with the problem definition and following through the literature review, the theoretical framework, research hypotheses, methodology part, data analysis, results, and discussion. The literature review helped establish gaps that warrant research based on the process-driven framework of policing and its implications, indirect pathways connecting empowerment and legitimacy, and the context to investigate police militarization. The literature review section also included an analysis of the study's theoretical basis. The research hypotheses were clearly delineated as congruent with the research problem. The methods section included data collection, sample size, and the description of the dependent and independent variables. The study employed an experimental design; thus, the analysis measured the relationship between the variables. Moreover, the results are congruent with the research purpose as they indicated...