Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Criminology

Faculty/School

Faculty of Arts

First Advisor

Dr. Jennifer Lavoie

Advisor Role

Supervisor

Second Advisor

Tarah Hodgkinson

Advisor Role

Second Reader

Abstract

Police are often assumed to be the "de facto" response to people in mental health crises. Contact between police and Canadians with mental illness and in crisis is routine and on the rise (Livingston, 2016). Police responses to these incidences have been criticized after several, highly publicized and tragic encounters between police and people in mental health crisis and the overrepresentation of people of colour in these instances. Media outlets determine which stories are prioritized, how they are framed, and which information to include or omit (Fawzi, 2018). Notably, public knowledge of police activities greatly impacts community perceptions of police legitimacy and social movements with this knowledge largely obtained through media consumption. Little research has focused on how media construct police interactions with people in crisis. Using a social constructionist lens, I conduct a media analysis, including qualitative content (Hsieh & Shannon, 2005), discourse (Berger, 2019), and framing analyses (Wimmer & Dominick, 2014), of Canadian news articles involving interactions between police and individuals in crisis to investigate how the term “de-escalation” is used and framed, which claims are made, who is making these claims, and how mental illness and people of colour are situated in these stories. Police were the most frequent claimsmakers, making 24% of all claims. The dominant narrative of the police is that there is a lack of mental health resources. Alternatively, community claimsmakers suggest the issue is aggressive police responses to people in crisis. Nonetheless, both groups of claimsmakers provide similar solutions, suggesting more mental health resources, greater involvement of mental health professionals in crisis intervention, less involvement of police in crisis intervention, and more mental health and de-escalation training for police officers.

Convocation Year

2025

Convocation Season

Spring

Download

Share

COinS