Examining Press Conference and Press Release Accounts of Canadian Police Shootings

Author(s):  
Kevin Walby ◽  
Babatunde Alabi

Little research examines the communication work that public police do following police shootings. Based on an analysis of 85 press releases, press conferences, and media interviews after police shootings in Canada spanning 2010–2020, we analyse narrative techniques used in police communications. Contributing to literature on police image management, we examine patterns in these communications, and we also identify silences and absences. We argue police press conferences and press releases after police shootings are less oriented toward misinformation or agenda-setting and more toward risk aversion. Sixty-two percent of communications in our sample used “euphemisms,” which obfuscate elements of use of force, while 31% of communications were “silent” and provided no justification for or information on the shootings. For these reasons, these communications may contribute to a sense of injustice felt by families of the victims of police shootings. Our findings may give pause to police administrators and media liaison officers who should consider what message such risk-averse communications send to families of victims, as well as to the public. In conclusion, we reflect on what these findings mean for literature on police image management.

2013 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 214-234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria De Paola

AbstractThis article studies the relationship between risk attitudes and individual characteristics focusing on the intergenerational transmission of risk preferences. We use a dataset of a sample of Italyn students which allows us to build different measures of risk aversion based, respectively, on a survey asking students about their willingness to invest in a risky asset and about their preferences for job security and on the results of an entry test using explicit penalty points in the case of incorrect answers. In line with the findings highlighted by the existing literature, we find that women are more risk averse than men, more patient subjects are more risk averse, while high-ability students are less risk averse. As far as intergenerational transmission of preferences is concerned, it emerges that students whose fathers are entrepreneurs have a higher propensity to take risks, while students whose fathers are employed in the public sector are more risk averse. Only fathers matter with regards to their children’s risk attitudes. These results are robust to different measures of risk aversion and to different specifications of our model.


Author(s):  
Ludmila Rusnac ◽  

By conveying inclusive, non-discriminatory messages, the press helps its audiences to better perceive the particularities and needs of some social groups and to adopt a tolerant attitude towards them. Usually, the information is presented in news and reports, there is practically no material in which the topics are treated in depth, so the public and society in general know very little about the problems of these people. Th e vast majority of the material is news based on press releases, without going out in the territory and discovering other topics, maybe not of immediate actuality, but also important from the perspective of the social impact.


2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 314-329
Author(s):  
Johan Burgaard ◽  
Mogens Steffensen

Risk aversion and elasticity of intertemporal substitution (EIS) are separated via the celebrated recursive utility building on certainty equivalents of indirect utility. Based on an alternative separation method, we formulate a questionnaire for simultaneous and consistent estimation of risk aversion, subjective discount rate, and EIS. From a representative group of 1,153 respondents, we estimate parameters for these preferences and their variability within the population. Risk aversion and the subjective discount rate are found to be in the orders of 2 and 0, respectively, not diverging far away from results from other studies. Our estimate of EIS in the order of 10 is larger than often reported. Background variables like age and income have little predictive power for the three estimates. Only gender has a significant influence on risk aversion in the usually perceived direction that females are more risk-averse than males. Using individual estimates of preference parameters, we find covariance between preferences toward risk and EIS. We present the background reasoning on objectives, the questionnaire, a statistical analysis of the results, and economic interpretations of these, including relations to the literature.


2016 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 133-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
Utkur Djanibekov ◽  
Grace B. Villamor

AbstractThis paper investigates the effectiveness of different market-based instruments (MBIs), such as eco-certification premiums, carbon payments, Pigovian taxes and their combination, to address the conversion of agroforests to monoculture systems and subsequent effects on incomes of risk-averse farmers under income uncertainty in Indonesia. For these, the authors develop a farm-level dynamic mean-variance model combined with a real options approach. Findings show that the conservation of agroforest is responsive to the risk-aversion level of farmers: the greater the level of risk aversion, the greater is the conserved area of agroforest. However, for all risk-averse farmers, additional incentives in the form of MBIs are still needed to prevent conversion of agroforest over the years, and only the combination of MBIs can achieve this target. Implementing fixed MBIs also contributes to stabilizing farmers’ incomes and reducing income risks. Consequently, the combined MBIs increase incomes and reduce income inequality between hardly and extremely risk-averse farmers.


2015 ◽  
Vol 22 (5) ◽  
pp. 655-665 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Mahdi HOSSEINIAN ◽  
David G. CARMICHAEL

Where a consortium of contractors is involved, there exist no guidelines in the literature on what the outcome sharing arrangement should be. The paper addresses this shortfall. It derives the optimal outcome sharing arrangement for risk-neutral and risk-averse contractors within the consortium, and between the consortium and a risk-neutral owner. Practitioners were engaged in a designed exercise in order to validate the paper’s propositions. The paper demonstrates that, at the optimum: the proportion of outcome sharing among contractors with the same risk-attitude should reflect the levels of their contributions; the proportion of outcome sharing among contractors with the same level of contribu­tion should be lower for contractors with higher levels of risk aversion; a consortium of risk-neutral contractors should receive or bear any favourable or adverse project outcome respectively; and the proportion of outcome sharing to a con­sortium of risk-averse contractors should reduce, and the fixed component of the consortium fee should increase, when the contractors become more risk-averse or the level of the project outcome uncertainty increases. The paper proposes an original solution to the optimal sharing problem in contracts with a consortium of contractors, thereby contributing to current practices in contracts management.


2018 ◽  
Vol 53 (3) ◽  
pp. 831-868 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruxanda Berlinschi ◽  
Ani Harutyunyan

This research investigates migrant self-selection on values, beliefs, and attitudes using data from Eastern European and former Soviet countries. We find that individuals who intend to emigrate are more politically active, more critical of governance and institutions, more tolerant toward other cultures, less tolerant of cheating, more optimistic, and less risk averse. With the exception of risk aversion, all selection patterns are heterogeneous across regions of origin. On the other hand, no self-selection pattern is detected on education, willingness to pay for public goods, and economic liberalism. These findings provide new insights into the determinants of international migration and reveal some of its less known consequences, such as a possible reduction of domestic pressure for political improvements in post-Soviet states due to politically active citizens’ higher propensity to emigrate.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea C. Hupman

Classification algorithms predict the class membership of an unknown record. Methods such as logistic regression or the naïve Bayes algorithm produce a score related to the likelihood that a record belongs to a particular class. A cutoff threshold is then defined to delineate the prediction of one class over another. This paper derives analytic results for the selection of an optimal cutoff threshold for a classification algorithm that is used to inform a two-action decision in the cases of risk aversion and risk neutrality. The results provide insight to how the optimal cutoff thresholds relate to the associated costs and the sensitivity and specificity of the algorithm for both the risk neutral and risk averse decision makers. The optimal risk averse threshold is not reliably above or below the optimal risk neutral threshold, but the relation depends on the parameters of a particular application. The results further show the risk averse optimal threshold is insensitive to the size of the data set or the magnitude of the costs, but instead is sensitive to the proportion of positive records in the data and the ratio of costs. Numeric examples and sensitivity analysis derive further insight. Results show the percent value gap from a misspecified risk attitude increases as the specificity of the classification algorithm decreases.


2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (6) ◽  
pp. 2967-2986 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Matte ◽  
Marie-Amélie Boucher ◽  
Vincent Boucher ◽  
Thomas-Charles Fortier Filion

Abstract. A large effort has been made over the past 10 years to promote the operational use of probabilistic or ensemble streamflow forecasts. Numerous studies have shown that ensemble forecasts are of higher quality than deterministic ones. Many studies also conclude that decisions based on ensemble rather than deterministic forecasts lead to better decisions in the context of flood mitigation. Hence, it is believed that ensemble forecasts possess a greater economic and social value for both decision makers and the general population. However, the vast majority of, if not all, existing hydro-economic studies rely on a cost–loss ratio framework that assumes a risk-neutral decision maker. To overcome this important flaw, this study borrows from economics and evaluates the economic value of early warning flood systems using the well-known Constant Absolute Risk Aversion (CARA) utility function, which explicitly accounts for the level of risk aversion of the decision maker. This new framework allows for the full exploitation of the information related to a forecasts' uncertainty, making it especially suited for the economic assessment of ensemble or probabilistic forecasts. Rather than comparing deterministic and ensemble forecasts, this study focuses on comparing different types of ensemble forecasts. There are multiple ways of assessing and representing forecast uncertainty. Consequently, there exist many different means of building an ensemble forecasting system for future streamflow. One such possibility is to dress deterministic forecasts using the statistics of past error forecasts. Such dressing methods are popular among operational agencies because of their simplicity and intuitiveness. Another approach is the use of ensemble meteorological forecasts for precipitation and temperature, which are then provided as inputs to one or many hydrological model(s). In this study, three concurrent ensemble streamflow forecasting systems are compared: simple statistically dressed deterministic forecasts, forecasts based on meteorological ensembles, and a variant of the latter that also includes an estimation of state variable uncertainty. This comparison takes place for the Montmorency River, a small flood-prone watershed in southern central Quebec, Canada. The assessment of forecasts is performed for lead times of 1 to 5 days, both in terms of forecasts' quality (relative to the corresponding record of observations) and in terms of economic value, using the new proposed framework based on the CARA utility function. It is found that the economic value of a forecast for a risk-averse decision maker is closely linked to the forecast reliability in predicting the upper tail of the streamflow distribution. Hence, post-processing forecasts to avoid over-forecasting could help improve both the quality and the value of forecasts.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Inês Cerveira ◽  
Vânia Baptista ◽  
Maria Alexandra Teodósio ◽  
Pedro Morais

Abstract Promoting the consumption of edible aquatic invasive species has gained popularity to minimize its impacts while easing pressure on native resources. Weakfish Cynoscion regalis (Bloch & Schneider, 1801) is one of the most recent invasive fish species in the Iberian Peninsula (Europe) which once sustained an important fishery in the native range (Northwest Atlantic Ocean). Portugal ranks third in the list of the world’s top fish consumers, so promoting a weakfish fishery could at least help minimize the impacts upon native species, since weakfish have innate traits that are likely appreciated by Portuguese fish consumers. However, introducing a new species to consumers is challenging owing to consumers’ habits and unfamiliarity with the species. So, we aimed to (i) evaluate the acceptance of weakfish by a panel of Portuguese fish consumers and (ii) create outreach actions – partnerships with local Chefs and press releases – to explain to a broader public what invasive species are and promote the consumption of edible aquatic invasive species. The survey that we conducted to Portuguese fish consumers showed that weakfish has great chances of being well accepted by the public – 90% of consumers would buy weakfish because they appreciated its appearance, flavour, and texture, besides being a wild fish. The outreach actions reached a few million people because 46 online articles were published, and three news pieces broadcasted on national television. Overall, our strategy greatly increased the public’s awareness about invasive species, which can be replicated elsewhere in the world.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANNISA

Implementation of Public Relations or Public Relations is the entire implementation and application of the role of public relations in an organization / agency / company that has been planned, and organized with the aim of creating and maintaining mutual understanding and connecting between companies and their communities. These objectives can be applied through various programs / programs that benefit companies and the public in supporting them with information openness. This research aims to study and describe the Public Relations Implementation of the PSDA Office to foster good relations with external publics such as the press, agreements, and others. information. In a good relationship made by the Public Relations Department of the PSDA to reporters in the disclosure of information through the form of activities of forming personal contacts, press releases, and contingency plans. The good relations of PSDA Public Relations with Cross-Chancellors in information disclosure are coordinating activities, inviting the Governor, providing assistance, and holding social activities. The good relations of PSDA Public Relations with Universities in information disclosure are through apprenticeship / job training / street vendors, as well as holding World Water Day seminars.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document