Social Media and Violence
In early 2021, the West Yorkshire Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) partnered with the Centre for Criminal Justice Studies at the University of Leeds to offer a Masters degree student the opportunity to collaborate on a research project.
The dual aims of the collaboration were to produce a bespoke piece of research linked to the VRU’s strategic priorities as well as to help develop the next generation of criminal justice and law professionals in West Yorkshire.
Criminal Law student Annabel Walker completed a research paper on the relationship between social media and violence, including an investigation of previously established interventions to address the ‘spillover’ of online tensions into real world violence. The findings from the paper will support the VRU’s objective of using the best available evidence to underpin violence reduction interventions in the region.