Police call-takers need to gather as much data as is needed, as quickly as possible, to determine whether and what action should be taken. On analysing 514 calls to a UK centre handling emergency (999) and non-emergency (101) calls, we find that the call-taker’s first substantive question already carries a diagnosis of the merits of the caller's case, and an implication of the call's likely outcome. Such questions come principally in four formats. On a gradient of increasing scepticism, these are: requests for the caller's location (which are treated as indicating that police action will be taken); open-ended requests for further information (treated as neutral); queries of the relevance of the incident or legitimacy of the caller, and reformulations of the caller's reason for calling (both projecting upcoming refusal of police action). We discuss the implications of this gradient for understanding how the calltakers manage their institutional goals. Data are in British English.

中文翻译：

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警方接听电话的第一个实质性问题预测了电话的结果

接警人员需要尽快收集尽可能多的数据，以确定是否应采取行动以及应采取何种行动。在分析英国处理紧急 (999) 和非紧急 (101) 呼叫中心的 514 个呼叫时，我们发现接听者的第一个实质性问题已经包含对呼叫者案情的诊断，以及呼叫的含义可能的结果。这些问题主要有四种形式。在怀疑程度增加的梯度上，这些是： 要求呼叫者的位置（这被视为表明将采取警察行动）；对进一步信息的开放式请求（视为中立）；询问事件的相关性或来电者的合法性，以及来电者的重新表述” 打电话的原因（都预测即将拒绝警方行动）。我们讨论了这种梯度对理解呼叫者如何管理他们的机构目标的影响。数据为英式英语。