Village heads, county-level officials and law enforcement officers are among the officials most vulnerable to a "public image crisis," according to a report by a public administration expert.

The past year has seen more government officials rocked by scandals, according to Tang Jun, director of the crisis management center at the Renmin University of China and author of the 2012 Report on Image Crisis of Officials.

"After the scandals, authorities did not pay adequate attention to repairing the damage to the government's image, thus creating the impression for the public that there are more officials with similar problems," Tang said.