THE STUDY WAS BEGUN IN 1977 AND CONCLUDED IN 1979. SURVEY DATA WERE GATHERED FROM 1,720 OFFICERS AND 717 SUPERVISORY PERSONNEL FROM 219 (53 PERCENT) OF THE 416 POLICE AND SHERIFF DEPARTMENTS IN THE PROGRAM. DEPARTMENTS SAMPLED REPRESENT A WIDE VARIATION IN DEPARTMENT SIZE, TYPE OF JURISDICTION SERVED, AND GEOGRAPHIC LOCATION. DATA WERE COLLECTED IN TWO MAJOR PHASES. FREQUENCY, IMPORTANCE, AND OTHER RATINGS WERE OBTAINED FOR 387 TASKS IN ORDER TO DEFINE PERFORMED DUTIES. ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND AND JOB ACTIVITY DATA WERE ALSO COLLECTED. PRIOR TO THE SECOND DATA COLLECTION PHASE, STATISTICAL AND RATIONAL TECHNIQUES WERE USED TO ORGANIZE THE TASKS INTO 33 HOMOGENEOUS TASK CLUSTERS. AGENCIES WERE COMPARED ACROSS THE 33 TASK GROUPS TO SEARCH FOR AGENCY SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES. FEW SIGNIFICANT DIFFERENCES WERE NOTED. IN THE SECOND PHASE, DATA WERE COLLECTED ON THE EXTENT TO WHICH 29 IDENTIFIED BEHAVIORS ARE REQUIRED FOR SUCCESSFUL PATROL OFFICER PERFORMANCE. AN AGENCY SPECIFIC WEIGHTING PROCEDURE WAS DESIGNED TO DETERMINE THE RELATIVE EMPHASIS EACH BEHAVIOR SHOULD RECEIVE IN THE ENTRY LEVEL SELECTION PROCESS. SOFTWARE WAS DEVELOPED TO PERMIT FUTURE COMPUTER GENERATION OF AN EXTENSIVE REPORT OF AGENCY SPECIFIC, JOB ANALYSIS FINDINGS FOR EACH PARTICIPATING AGENCY. THE DATA BASE GENERATED DURING THE STUDY WILL BE USED TO DEVELOP AND VALIDATE ENTRY LEVEL SELECTION STANDARDS. OTHER POSSIBLE USES INCLUDE THE DEVELOPMENT OF A PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL SYSTEM AND THE ASSESSMENT OF CHANGES IN THE PATROL POSITION IN THE FUTURE. REFERENCES AND APPENDIXES ARE INCLUDED IN THE PAPER. (AUTHOR ABSTRACT MODIFIED-LWM).