Wednesday, 30 March 2016 - 7:46pm |
National News

Police release social experiment #2 (Would you stop to help this man?)

2 min read

NZ Police have released the second social experiment video in their recruitment campaign series.

In the first social experiment scenario, a young boy in a busy city street was filmed eating out of a rubbish bin, with a range of reactions from real life passers-by.

"That video went viral within a day and has hugely exceeded our campaign expectations.  Our video has now reached more than three million Facebook feeds, had more than 800,000 views, and more than 30,000 likes, shares and comments.  The video concept was also featured by media in many countries, including Australia, the UK, China, United States, Ireland, Japan, Malaysia and Germany," says Deputy Chief Executive Public Affairs Karen Jones.

"We set out to tell a compelling story about the special type of person who chooses to be a police officer, and at the same time reach out to like-minded people in the community to join us."

"We wanted to encourage conversations within our target group of 18 - 29 year olds and it's great to see that now happening on a number of online channels."

"In our second video scenario we see a man seemingly in pain and lying down on the pavement as people walk past.  The video is designed to challenge our perceptions - the man could be someone who has maybe had too much to drink, or he could be passed out due to a medical condition.  Do people ignore him and walk on past? Or do they stop to see if he is okay?"

The second video can be found here: NZ Police Recruitment

"For the people who say they would have stopped, then you may be just the kind of person NZ Police is looking for.  We want to attract people who care and who want to make a positive difference."

"With NZ Police there are many opportunities to turn that care into positive action."

NZ Police want to recruit 400 cops this year.  The recruitment campaign will mainly be promoted online and specifically aims to reach out to 18 - 29 year olds, and in particular Maori, Pasifika, Chinese, Indian, Latin American, African and Middle Eastern people so we better represent the diverse communities we serve.

ENDS

Police media contact: Rachel Purdom, 021 908 101.

newcops.co.nz

2nd video background

In this new video around 100 people were filmed walking past our actor in the street in around 25 minutes of filming.  There were seven instances of groups or individuals stopping to ask if he was okay (21 people in total).  Again, it is not Police's intention to highlight the individuals who did not stop, so features are blurred in the video.

NZ Police have filmed five social experiment scenario videos in total, which will be released over this year.