Anger, fear, and frozenness: Exploring the emotive aspect of anti-police sentiment

Anti-police sentiment has emerged as a growing phenomenon in recent years, characterised by intense negative attitudes towards police. Despite increasing scholarly interest, the lack of a clear definition of anti-police sentiment hinders conceptualisation, measurement, and comparison of findings across jurisdictions. This study aims to provide conceptual clarity by employing sentiment analysis to systematically and objectively explore the emotions underlying anti-police sentiment. Analysis of the negative discourse across 1140 comments on Reddit about police, found that anti-police sentiment is associated with the emotions anger, fear, and frozenness, and potentially may trigger fight, flight, freeze responses in citizens encountering the police. Further, analysis of frequent terms highlights key social issues driving anti-police sentiment, such as police responses to domestic violence and police misconduct. The study contributes to the understanding of anti-police sentiment by identifying the underlying emotions and their potential behavioural outcomes, providing a foundation for future research and policy interventions. •Anti-police sentiment is a growing phenomenon.•Understanding anti-police emotions may help hypothesise behavioural outcomes.•Emotions driving anti-police sentiment include anger, fear, and frozenness.•High intensity emotions may trigger fight, flight, and freeze behavioural responses.•Key issues for anti-police sentiment: police misconduct; police responses to DV.