The Police Officer's Dilemma: A Decade of Research on Racial Bias in the Decision to Shoot
Abstract
We review sociological, correlational, and experimental research that examines the effect of a target's race on the decision to shoot. Much of this work involves computer‐based simulations of a police encounter, in which a participant must decide whether or not to shoot a potentially hostile target who is either Black or White. Experimental work with undergraduate participants reveals a clear pattern of bias (a tendency to shoot Black targets but not Whites), which is associated with stereotypes linking Blacks with the concept of danger. Subsequent work with police officers presents a more complex pattern. Although police are affected by target race in some respects, they generally do not show a biased pattern of shooting. We suggest that police performance depends on the exercise of cognitive control, which allows officers to overcome the influence of stereotypes, and we conclude with potential implications of this research for law enforcement.
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Training may improve officers' ability to exert cognitive control to focus on information that is actually relevant to the shooting decision, such as the object in a suspect's hand, rather than on the suspect's race.
“Training may improve of fi cers ' ability to exert cognitive control to focus on information that is actually relevant to the shooting decision, such as the object in a suspect ' s hand, rather than on the suspect ' s race (Correll et al., 2014).”
From A call to dismantle systemic racism in criminal legal systems. (2022) · cites this paper as Correll et al., 2014
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References 56 · Cited by 198
- Authors
- Correll, J., Hudson, S. M., Guillermo, S., & Ma, D. S.
- Affiliations
- University of Colorado Boulder (US)
- California State University, Northridge (US)
- Corresponding author
- Correll, Joshua
- Venue
- Social and Personality Psychology Compass
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2014-05
- Volume
- 8
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 201-213
- ISSN
- 1751-9004 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2133168391
- Cited by
- 198
- References
- 56
- Citations by year
- 2026: 22 · 2025: 16 · 2024: 29 · 2023: 16 · 2022: 27 · 2021: 20 · 2020: 13 · 2019: 16 · 2018: 10 · 2017: 12 · 2016: 8 · 2015: 7 · 2014: 2
- FWCI
- 62.99
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Social and Personality Psychology Compass (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (0642580)
- Russell Sage Foundation
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Policing Practices and Perceptions
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Deception detection and forensic psychology
- Keywords
- racial bias, use of force, stereotypes, cognitive control, police encounters, black-white disparities, law enforcement
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