Understanding Police Bias

Professor Introduction: Objective Analysis Research in progress for CRIJ 1301: Introduction to Criminal Justice Faculty Mentor: Stefanie LeMaire The following article contains a compilation of studies that examined police bias and the citizen’s race to determine if officers are influenced by the citizen’s race when making discretionary decisions. When officers use race to make discretionary decisions, this can negatively impact the relationship between the police and its citizens. It is important to understand that the studies discussed have their limitations therefore more research is needed to produce reliable results. Some researchers have suggested that officers have been influenced by race, and this impacts their decision to use excessive force with citizens. Other authors have argued that situational factors perpetuate the officer’s decision to use force rather than race. Implicit and explicit bias are also explained to determine if police officers have a bias that is unknown to them, or they have a significant bias that is intentionally utilized during their job duties, and if those biases, whether known or unknown to the officer, affect their decisions. Again, these studies are not without limitations, and due to the varied results, further studies are recommended