Motivations to enter the police profession in the Caribbean: Evidence from a cohort of Jamaican police recruits

While the topic of motivations for entering policing has proliferated in the Global North, there are limited studies examining the motivations of recruits who enter policing in the Caribbean. Therefore, the current effort was designed to analyze the motivations for entering the police profession by gathering data from police recruits in training at the National Police College of Jamaica via standardized, self-administered questionnaires. Data were gathered from 161 police recruits and analyzed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences. The analyses were based on gender, age, marital status, and educational level and sought to determine the motivations of police recruits who entered the Jamaica Constabulary Force. The findings indicated that the major motivations for entering policing in Jamaica were the desire to assist others, the opportunity to further education, and the opportunity to enforce laws. This study provides insights into the motivations for entering policing in Jamaica and is a starting point for future research on the motivations for entering the police profession in the Caribbean.