Cross cultural examination on third-party crime reportingReporting illegal activity is crucial in preventing criminal acts and responding them effectively.
Police can receive information about criminal activity from victims and witnesses, but thirdparty reporters who are not directly involved in the incident. Third parties usually report crimes
when victims or bystanders are reluctant to do the reporting. Notably, third-party reporting may
be heavily influenced by culture. This study aims to research whether cross-cultural third-party
crime reporting is different between the American and Japanese cultures.
Crime Reporting
Linning and Barnes (2022) investigated “third-party crime reporting” and found it was
connected to elements such as social integration and faith in the justice system. The study found
that those who reported crimes to an “impartial third party were likelier to experience a sense of
community” and have faith in the justice system. The individuals who felt safe in their
communities and trusted the police were more inclined to report criminal activity. The ones with
low faith in police performance and who felt a lack of social cohesion were less likely to report
illegal activity. On the same crime reporting topic, compliance management, whistleblowing,
and internal monitoring were all discussed by Van Rooij and Fine (2019) as tools to reduce
corporate crime. According to the results, compliance management techniques like training and
communication favor the “whistleblower” policy. The research also confirmed that internal
monitoring tools like, hotlines for employees, facilitated whistleblowing. In turn, the exposure of
unethical and unlawful business activities (due to whistleblowing) helped reduce corporate
crime. The research shows compliance management and whistleblowing are practical tools of
preventing and identifying wrongdoings.
Concerning the reporting of hate crimes, Wonget et al. (2020) assessed the performance
of independent hate crime reporting organizations. The research showed third-party reporting
centers are beneficial in increasing hate crime reports. The findings showed that people who
reported hate crimes through independent reporting centers were more likely to be reported as
victims. Accessibility, anonymity, and quality of service were all regarded as essential aspects of
third-party reporting centers for hate crimes. Based on these findings, the researchers conclude
that independent reporting hotlines are crucial for increasing hate crime reporting.
Additionally, Romaniuc et al. (2022) looked at the cultural disparities in peer reporting
procedures between Moldova and France to better understand the impact of globalization on
reporting norms. Simulations of tax evasion were utilized in the study to evaluate participants’
honesty. The participants in France were found to be more inclined to report tax evasion,
whereas the participants in Moldova were less likely to report a crime. Romaniuc et al. (2022)
added that cultural elements such as trust in institutions and views towards the state are
hypothesized to affect people’s propensity to report crimes. The research shows how crucial it is
to consider cultural norms when instituting new methods of third-party reporting.
Additionally, Levesque et al. (2022) looked at witness accounts of people who were held
in US courts while awaiting their day in deportation proceedings. The research found that thirdparty comments were instrumental in providing context for the lives of immigrants in detention.
The study also emphasized the difficulties experienced by outside observers, such as language
and access restrictions during court hearings. To increase public trust in the immigration court
system and hold judges and attorneys accountable, the study’s authors conclude that independent
witness observation is crucial. Fessler and Navarrete (2004) also investigated bystanders’
perspectives on reporting sibling incest. Results showed that people were more likely to report
sibling incest when the perpetrator was male and when the relationship was aggressive.
The study also discovered that victims of sibling incest were less likely to come forward if the
offender was female and the connection was warm. The study’s results indicate that gender and
relationship dynamics affect information reporting on crime.
Conceptually, some studies focus on specific forms of crime regarding crime reporting.
Felson and Pare (2005) looked at reports of sexual assault and domestic violence made by people
who knew the victim or perpetrator. The study found that a victim’s perceptions of the police’s
effectiveness in such crimes and their relationships with the perpetrator played a role in whether
the individual will disclose the offenses to authorities. Levesque et al. (2022) also examined
witness descriptions of cases in a US-detained immigration court. In this environment, reporting
crime is difficult due to the unique characteristics of the court and the scarcity of legal
representation. The researcher discovered that outsiders’ opinions of the justice system were
conflicted, and these people frequently felt helpless to effect change. Hate crime reporting has
also received attention, leading some communities to set up independent hate crime reporting
centers. Wong et al. (2020) evaluated the effectiveness of such centers and found that they were
usually helpful in enhancing victim satisfaction. However, they also found recruiting victims to
use the services difficult.
Crime Reporting in America and Japan
When it comes to keeping the peace in any community, a reliable crime reporting system
is crucial. The system helps spot illicit acts and track down offenders. Nonetheless, there are
substantial variations in how crimes are seen and reported between cultural groups. Contrasting
the methods used to report crimes in the United States and Japan is the primary subject of this
research. According to many studies conducted in the United States, several variables can affect
the likelihood of a third person reporting a crime.
For instance, according to Lining and Barnes (2022), third-party reporting has been
linked favorably to societal cohesion and trust in the police’s ability to solve crimes. Levesque et
al. (2022) came to a similar conclusion and stipulated that people would be more willing to
report observations of detained immigrants if they believed that doing so would affect the case
outcome. However, Wong et al. (2020) discovered that the U.S. hates crime reporting centers
faced obstacles such as poor funding and limited public knowledge, which may have hindered
their effectiveness in encouraging third-party reporting. On the other hand, an extensive study on
third-party crime reporting in Japan has yet to be conducted. Regardless, Romaniuc et al. (2022)
looked at cultural variations in how people in Japan and other nations report each other for tax
evasion games.
Notably, because of cultural differences in the value put on group unity and face-saving,
the authors found that Japanese participants were less likely to disclose tax evasion by their peers
than the other nationality participants. Notably, corporate crime can also be the subject of thirdparty criminal reporting. Among the many strategies for preventing internal corporate crime, Van
Rooij and Fine (2019) highlight compliance management, whistleblowing, and internal
monitoring. Such methods prevent wrongdoing within an organization from spreading by
prompting employees to report any instances of criminal behavior they observe.
Linning and Barnes (2022) investigated how community cohesiveness and trust in law
enforcement influence citizens’ propensity to report crimes they witnessed firsthand. The
individuals who had a greater sense of social cohesion and had more faith in the efficiency of the
police were more inclined to report criminal activity, according to the study. The study’s result
fits what people know about the contrasting cultures of the United States and Japan. People in
Japan are more inclined to report crimes to the police because of the country’s high levels of
social cohesion and trust in institutions (Romaniuc et al., 2022). Americans, in comparison, are
less inclined to report crimes because of the country’s lower social cohesion (Felson & Pare,
2005).
Culture also plays a role in how people report corporate crimes. Compliance management
and internal monitoring are all recommended by Van et al. (2019) as practical means of
preventing corporate crime. Western societies like the US have a rich tradition of transparency
and accountability, which may explain why these tactics are common in the States.
However, there is less of a tendency to report corporate crimes in Japan due to the country’s
strong culture of obedience and loyalty (Van et al., 2019). Additionally, domestic assaults and
sexual abuse reported by friends and family members are other examples of how cultural
disparities in crime reporting techniques manifest themselves. People in the US are less inclined
to disclose crimes of this nature, according to research by Felson and Pare (2005). The
researchers stated that such causes include a societal stigma against reporting such crimes and a
distrust of law enforcement.
On the other hand, as per Linning & Barnes (2022), the Japanese view domestic abuse as
a private issue, and victims are reluctant to disclose it to the authorities. As with immigration
proceedings, there is evidence of cultural variations in how people report crimes while detained.
Levesque et al. (2022) study focused on detained immigration courts in the US. The research
showed that observers from non-Western cultures were more likely to report violations of human
rights committed in immigration courts. The research is in line with Linning and Barnes’s (2022)
research showing that people of different cultures have varied conceptions of the role of law
enforcement. Human rights violations in immigration courts may go unreported in countries with
solid cultures of loyalty to authority, such as Japan (Linning & Barnes, 2022). Lastly, there are
also cultural disparities in reporting hate crimes.
Wong et al. (2020) conducted a study to determine how well third-party reporting centers
for hate crimes perform. The research showed that the centers performed better in the United
States than in Japan. The reason is the societal belief that hate crimes are uncommon and not a
significant issue in Japan (Wong et al., 2020). As a result, victims of hate crimes in Japan may be
hesitant to report them.
Influence of Gender on Third-Party Reporting of Crime
Desmond and Valdez (2012) explore the impact of third-party policing policies,
particularly nuisance property ordinances in Milwaukee, US. This law sanctions property owners
for the behavior of tenants that warrant undue attention by the police. As such, the legislation
creates a disincentive among third parties to report crimes. It is, therefore, common for landlords
to discourage tenants who witness crimes from calling 911 (Desmond & Valdez, 2012).
Consequently, domestic violence is seen as a private affair, the same way Linning and Barnes
(2022) observe among the Japanese. This attitude entrenches violence against women as
neighbors are less inclined to call 911 for fear of antagonizing landlords.
Notably, the authors observe that predominantly black neighborhoods received more
citations than other neighborhoods. Out of 503 properties that were considered nuisances in the
study, 319 were black, 18 were white, 14 were Hispanic, and 152 were from mixed
neighborhoods (Desmond & Valdez, 2012). Properties in integrated black neighborhoods had the
highest probability of being considered nuisances, confirming the minority threat thesis
(Desmond & Valdez, 2012). The view of black males are more prone to violence is found to
increase the likelihood of police responding if the suspect fits this description.
One unfortunate finding in this study is that 33% of citations for nuisance emanated from
domestic violence, which landlords addressed by often evicting battered women (Desmond &
Valdez, 2012). Women were also found to be overrepresented in such calls to 911 and were
disproportionately impacted by the nuisance property ordinances. In this study, landlords
defended their inclination of evicting women observing that they discourage them from calling
the police over incidents of domestic violence and if that happens, the police expect the issue
eliminated rather than addressed gradually (Desmond & Valdez, 2012). The treatment of
domestic violence and discouraging third-party reporting is consistent with victim shaming and
stigmatization, which entrenches the problem.
On average, Milwaukee reported a case of domestic violence every 4.6 days. Women
were victims in 81% of these cases, and in 88% of the cases, the abusers were men (Desmond &
Valdez, 2012). The author observes that the city’s authorities equated domestic violence to a
nuisance. This perception is detrimental to women. It not only condones it but penalizes a third
party who makes a 911 call for help. A woman who is a witness of domestic abuse has to choose
between the need for social solidarity if they report an incident and the risk of being evicted.
Therefore, the low social cohesion that (Felson & Pare, 2005) observed among Americans
emanates from rational decisions by third parties who may want to help but cannot afford to
jeopardize their welfare and tenancy. More significantly, landlords expect the victim to halt the
abuse otherwise, they will be evicted (Desmond & Valdez, 2012). This expectation seems to
erroneously communicate that there is no problem for third-party witnesses to address and that it
is the victim who is supposed to save themselves from the situation.
Foster et al. (2019) explore whether the age and gender of children as well as the
interviewer’s gender impact the testimony of children witnesses. The study acknowledges that
from time to time, children are likely to be witnesses to crimes, and, as such, it is important to
assess the veracity and reliability of their testimonies. The research manipulated the interviewer’s
gender allowing the researchers to assess the children’s ability to tell purposeful lies. Participants
were aged 6-11 years. The findings demonstrated that in situations where respondents were
accused, boys were more willing than girls to disclose a theft without being probed (Foster et al.,
2019). In situations where the respondents were truthfully accusing, they gave lengthier
testimony to same-gendered adults than to an interviewer of the opposite gender. When denying,
children demonstrated an affinity to disclose the theft earlier to a male interviewer compared to a
female one (Foster et al., 2019). With increased age, the likelihood to lie declined, they were
inclined to disclose earlier when accusing and their explanations become lengthier and more
consistent.
The authors suppose that the findings have significant implications in third-party
reporting crime when involving children witnesses. For instance, honesty among children
witnesses can be enhanced by ensuring that the interviewer is of the same gender (Foster et al.,
2019). As expected, cognitive development allows children to provide consistent accounts but
also an ability to choose what to disclose and what not to, implying that they could withhold
information. Therefore, probing and assessing their testimonies must consider such risks.
Age and Third-Party Crime Reporting
Holdstock et al. (2022) conducted an influential study that sought to compare lineup
identification among young adults on the one hand and older adults on the other to explore if
there were differences between the two groups. The authors note that an aging population
supposes an aging pool of witnesses, warranting an investigation as to whether age impacts the
identification of perpetrators. While describing a perpetrator has been found to reduce the
identification accuracy among young individuals, this remains underexplored among older adults
necessitating this research (Holdstock et al., 2022). The research findings showed that young and
older adults made fewer correct identification after they had described the perpetrator,
confirming the incidence of ‘verbal overshadowing’ (Holdstock et al., 2022). However,
describing the perpetrator did not significantly reduce discriminability but made the witnesses
more conservative in their identification. It appears that once the perpetrator is described, the
witness is cautious of the risk of incriminating a potentially innocent suspect.
The speed and confidence with which individuals from both groups identified
perpetrators predicted their accuracy, especially when they were not required to first describe the
perpetrator. Therefore, while older adults have poorer memory than young adults, they are likely
to be correct when they are confident about their identification (Holdstock et al., 2022). The
authors opine that the findings demonstrate the essence of noting the speed with which witnesses
identify suspects in a lineup, as this can give jurors and judges insights regarding their
confidence in identification. Besides, the ability to discriminate between perpetrators and
innocent suspects was lower among older adults than young participants (Holdstock et al., 2022).
The former suffers from a decline in episodic memory which explains this fact.
On its part, Love (2015) considers the effect of age on a witness’s perception, memory,
and ability to communicate in court. The study explores the physical and cognitive changes
associated with age. It notes that evidence in psychology shows that older witnesses tend to give
a lesser detailed account of happenings than young witnesses. They are also less accurate
regarding their ability to recall necessitating that the justice system undertakes the necessary
accommodations (Love, 2015). Elderly witnesses are bound to experience positive and negative
ageism. While they are likely to be seen as honest, if their testimony is found to be inaccurate,
the latter is likely to discount its perceived reliability. The author recommends that testimonies
obtained from elderly witnesses should be cognizant of the identified age-related memory
decline. They propose the use of sequential lineups, cognitive reinstatement techniques, and
special instructions (Love, 2015). The justice system should therefore treat the testimonies of
third parties with a consideration of the age of the witness.
Synthesis of Literature
There is a wide disparity in how crimes get reported between cultures. Improving crime
prevention and public safety is possible by identifying reporting barriers and establishing
effective measures to promote third-party reporting. The findings indicate that cultural
differences influence the discrepancies in crime reporting patterns between the two cultures in
the valuation of social cohesiveness, transparency, accountability, faith in institutions, and hate
crimes. However, more study is required to discover the causes of these cultural differences and
create solutions that are sensitive to those differences. To add to that, there is very limited
research done when it comes to studying the difference between Japanese and American cultures
regarding third party crime reporting. For this study, I plan on sending out questions to American
and Japanese college students to see which culture tends to report crimes. I plan on using a
qualitative analysis and have students answer interview-based questions. With previous studies
in mind, I hypothesize that there may be a significant difference between the crime-reporting
rates of American and Japanese college students.
Gender and age also have significant impacts on third-party reporting of crime. Gender
shapes the perception of relations and creates potential sanctions on those who report crimes.
The trivialization of what would be otherwise a crime implies that third parties choose to be
passive and do nothing. Regarding child witnesses, it is important to consider the impact of the
gender of the interviewer and the respondent’s age as this impact the quality of the testimony.
Age also impacts the ability of witnesses to recall. It is, therefore, important that this factor is
accounted for when dealing with such witnesses.
Methods
Convenience sampling was used in qualitative research. There was a total of 10
participants who answered and an open-ended survey. Out of the 10 participants, 50% were
American and 50% were Japanese. Within that, there were 60% male participants (30% for both
American and Japanese) and 40% female participants (20% American and 20% Japanese). The
participants were given a consent form to sign and then answered a 12-item open-ended survey
with questions such as What type of neighborhood did you grow up in? Have you ever dialed
911 or 119? Have you ever had any interaction with the police? Have you witnessed any crimes
being committed? Would you report any crimes you witness? And so on.
Results
The results indicated that, there was not a big significant difference between Japanese and
American young adults in the case of third part crime reporting. 90% of the men answered that
they would only report a crime if it was violent and 10% (American) reported that they would
not call the cops unless someone was physically harmed. 100% of the women (both Japanese and
American) reported that if they witnessed a crime, they would call the police right away.
Discussion
References
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Foster, I., Wyman, J., Tong, D., Colwell, K., Talwar, V. (2019). Does eyewitness and
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