A Behavior Analysts' Journey into Data Science in Law Enforcement: A Call to Action

Discussion articles in behavioral sciences have been non-existent in the review of data science (DS) techniques employed overall, but more specifically for law enforcement (LE) and crime analysis. For this review, the author analyzed eight behavior science peer-reviewed journals for the presence and relevance of specific keywords to identify DS usage in law enforcement articles. Overall, this author found an underwhelming amount of DS techniques being utilized within the field and zero research articles employed specifically from a law enforcement lens. Furthermore, in 2012, it was surprising to find that keywords for DS overall began appearing the behavioral science journals, but not in the LE area. Further discussion about the results of this literature review will lead to suggestions to increase the use of DS methods in behavioral science research in LE environments.