Korean Americans’ Perceptions of Police Legitimacy and Cooperations with Police: Normative and Instrumental Pathways

The current study examines the willingness of cooperate with police among Korean Americans through the lens of the normative and instrumental pathways of police legitimacy. Using a survey of 183 Korean residents in the Atlanta Metropolitan area, this study tests how normative factors (i.e., procedural fairness) and instrumental factors (i.e., police effectiveness) mediate the relationship between past victimization experiences and language proficiency, and the willingness to cooperate with the police. The findings indicate that procedural fairness had a significant influence on the willingness of cooperate with police while police effectiveness affected the willingness of cooperate with police only in hate crime incidents. Also, prior victimization experience and language proficiency directly affected the willingness to cooperate, not indirectly through perceptions of police legitimacy. Policy implications are suggested based on the findings.