I am using the ‘Outlook on Life’ survey data to investigate if age or education play a role in whether people think blacks and other minorities are treated the same as whites in the criminal justice system (W1_K4 in the codebook) or in whether they have trust in the legal system (W1_K1_C in the codebook).

Do you think that blacks and other minorities are treated the same in the criminal justice system?

ANOVA revealed that there is no significance to the age groups of my analysis (18-29, 20-34, 45-59, and 60+) when looking at the question of whether blacks and minorities are treated the same as whites in the criminal justice system. F (3, 1,994)=0.56, p=0.6408. The null hypothesis is accepted. The means of the age groups are not significantly different according to the Duncan post hoc test.

ANOVA revealed that education level has significance to the answer to this question. F (1, 1,996)=12.35, p=.0001. Post hoc comparisons of the mean revealed that individuals with some college or higher levels of education reported a stronger belief that blacks and other minorities do not receive equal treatment (mean of 5.4 verses a mean of 5.1 for those with high school or lower levels of education). The responses are on a 1 to 7 scale with 1 corresponding to ‘receive equal treatment’ and 7 corresponding to ‘do not receive equal treatment’.

ANOVA revealed that there is significance to the age groups when considering the question of trust in the legal system. F (3, 2,226)=5.15, p=0.0015. The null hypothesis is rejected. Post hoc comparisons of the mean using the Duncan test revealed that younger people (18-29) are statistically more likely to distrust the legal system (mean 2.8254) than any of the other age groups - 30-44 (mean 2.7367), 45-59 (mean 2.7098), and 60+ (mean 2.6540).

Education level is also significant for measuring general trust in the legal system. F (1, 2,228)=24.39, p=.0001. Responses were originally coded as 1-Just about always to 4-Never and were grouped for analysis into Trust (1-Just about always and 2-Most of the time) and Mistrust (3-Only some of the time and 4-Never). The Duncan test post hoc comparisons indicate that the mean of 2.8068 for trust in the legal system by those with high school or lower levels of education is significantly different than the mean of 2.6595 for those with some college or higher levels of education.

Full results available as a PDF.

SAS Program Code

Full code of my SAS program is shown below.

LIBNAME mydata "/courses/d1406ae5ba27fe300 " access=readonly;
DATA new; set mydata.oll_pds;

LABEL   W1_K4="Do you think that blacks & other minorities are treated the same as whites in the criminal justice system?"
        W1_K1_C="Do You trust the legal system?"
        PPEDUCAT="Education Level"
        PPAGECT4="Age";

/*set missing data*/
IF W1_K4=-1 THEN W1_K4=.; /* treated equal */
IF W1_K4=9 THEN W1_K4=.; /* if they don't know, also blank */
IF W1_K1_C=-1 THEN W1_K1_C=.;

/* subset to include high school education or less
IF PPEDUCAT LE 2; */

/* subset the data to include no trust in legal system 3-sometimes & 4-never
IF W1_K1_C GE 3;*/

/* subset to include trust in legal system 1-always & 2-most times 
IF W1_K1_C LE 2;*/

IF PPEDUCAT LE 2 THEN PPEDUCATgroup=1;
ELSE IF PPEDUCAT GE 3 THEN PPEDUCATgroup=2;
 
PROC SORT; by CASEID;

/* add formatting for W1_K1_C - Trust Legal System */
PROC FORMAT;
    value W1_K1_C_groups
    1-2='Trust'
    3-high='Mistrust';

/* formatting for PPEDUCAT - Education Level */
PROC FORMAT;
    value PPEDUCAT_groups
    1-2='High School or lower'
    3-high='Some college or higher';

/* formatting for W1_K4 - Treated Same as Whites table */
PROC FORMAT;
    value W1_K4_groups
    low-1='Receive equal treatment'
    7='Do not receive equal treatment'
    9-high='Not sure';

/* formatting for PPAGECT4 - Age */
PROC FORMAT;
    value PPAGECT4_groups
    1='18-29'
    2='30-44'
    3='45-59'
    4='60+';

PROC PRINT; VAR W1_K1_C PPEDUCAT W1_K4 W1_M1 PPAGECT4;

/* general form for anova
PROC ANOVA; CLASS CAT_EXPLANATORY;
MODEL QUANTITATIVE_RESPONSE = CAT_EXPLANATORY;
MEANS CAT_EXPLANATORY;
*/

/* look at blacks & minorities treated same - W1_K4 */
PROC ANOVA; CLASS PPAGECT4;
MODEL W1_K4=PPAGECT4;
MEANS PPAGECT4/DUNCAN;
    Format W1_K4 W1_K4_groups.;
    Format PPAGECT4 PPAGECT4_groups.;

PROC ANOVA; CLASS PPEDUCAT;
MODEL W1_K4=PPEDUCAT;
MEANS PPEDUCAT/DUNCAN;
    Format W1_K4 W1_K4_groups.;
    Format PPEDUCAT PPEDUCAT_groups.;

/* look at trust in the legal systeam - W1_K1_C */
PROC ANOVA; CLASS PPAGECT4;
MODEL W1_K1_C=PPAGECT4;
MEANS PPAGECT4/DUNCAN;
    Format W1_K4 W1_K4_groups.;
    Format PPAGECT4 PPAGECT4_groups.;

PROC ANOVA; CLASS PPEDUCAT;
MODEL W1_K1_C=PPEDUCAT;
MEANS PPEDUCAT/DUNCAN;
    Format W1_K1_C W1_K1_C_groups.;
    Format PPEDUCAT PPEDUCAT_groups.;

RUN;