Compliance, noncompliance, and the in-between: causal effects of civilian demeanor on police officers’ cognitions and emotions

Abstract

Objectives Police legitimacy can hinge on what happens in police-civilian encounters, yet much remains unknown about the socio-psychological processes involved in these bilateral interactions, especially those affecting officers. We integrate insights from policing research with theories and findings from scholarship on moral psychology, interpersonal strain, and victimization fear to develop hypotheses about the situational effects of civilian demeanor on officers' cognitions (suspicion and perceived danger) and emotions (anger, frustration, annoyance, and fear). Methods We administered a series of three randomized vignettes involving routine policecivilian encounters to 546 officers working in a large city in the southwestern United States. We randomized civilian behavior-compliant, bad attitude (compliant but disrespectful), or noncompliant-and the encounter type-offense-based versus dispatch-initiated. Results Demeanor exerts a large causal effect on what officers think and feel in policecivilian encounters. In each experiment, civilian hostility and disrespect increased officers' self-reported suspicion, perceived danger, and antagonistic emotions (anger, frustration, and annoyance). In some cases, it also increased their fear. Conclusions Each of these cognitions and emotions may separately influence police decision-making, and each carries unique policy implications. Our results also suggest the efficacy of experimental surveys to unpack the dynamics of police-civilian interactions.

Randomized controlled trial of social interaction police training

“…In prior research, questions have been raised about the validity of attitudinal measures in accurately assessing behaviors (see e.g., Scott & Willits, 1994); however, studies have shown hypothetical choices in vignettes to have good predictive validity (see, e.g., Alexander & Becker, 1978; Hainmueller, Hangartner, & Yamamoto, 2015). Vignettes also have been used in a variety of policing contexts to assess hypothetical officer behavior (McLean, 2019; Nix, Pickett, & Mitchell, 2019; Nix, Pickett, Wolfe, & Campbell, 2017; Phillips, 2009).…”

Body-Worn Cameras and Transparency: Experimental Evidence of Inconsistency in Police Executive Decision-Making

“…This is a widely used method for analyzing judgment and decision-making (Auspurg & Hinz, 2014;Pickett, Roche, & Pogarsky, 2018;Reisig, Mays, & Telep, 2018), and our use of randomization enhances the internal validity of our designbut it is nevertheless artificial. We also did not manipulate other relevant details, such as the presence of victims or witnesses (Garner, Maxwell, & Heraux, 2002), dispatch priming (Taylor, 2020), or the suspect's demeanor (Nix, Pickett, & Mitchell, 2019) each of which might factor into an executive's assessment of the OIS and subsequent decision making. Future research should explore whether these factors play a role in executives' decision making as it relates to release of BWC footage.…”

“…Then, to test our hypotheses regarding how executives would perceive and react to a critical incident captured on BWC, we presented the sample with an experimental vignette about one of their officers responding to a home invasion call and fatally shooting the suspect. 3 Policing scholars increasingly are using experimental vignettes to study decision-making (Darwinkel et al, 2013;Hine & Murphy, 2019;Nix, Pickett, & Mitchell, 2019;Phillips, 2009Phillips, , 2020, and for good reason. For example, McLean et al 2020recently used experimental vignettes involving a suspicious person call to assess the impact of a social interaction training program in two agencies.…”

Body-worn cameras and transparency: Experimental Evidence of Inconsistency in Police Executive Decision-Making

“…Then, to test our hypotheses regarding how executives would perceive and react to a critical incident captured on BWC, we presented the sample with an experimental vignette about one of their o cers responding to a home invasion call and fatally shooting the suspect. 3 Policing scholars increasingly are using experimental vignettes to study decision-making (Darwinkel et al, 2013;Hine & Murphy, 2019;Nix, Pickett, & Mitchell, 2019;Phillips, 2009;Phillips, 2020), and for good reason. For example, McLean et al (2020) recently used experimental vignettes involving a suspicious person call to assess the impact of a social interaction training program in two agencies.…”

“…This is a widely used method for analyzing judgment and decision-making (Auspurg & Hinz, 2014;Pickett, Roche, et al, 2018;Reisig et al, 2018), and our use of randomization enhances the internal validity of our design -but it is nevertheless arti cial. We also did not manipulate other relevant details, such as the presence of victims or witnesses (Garner et al, 2002), dispatch priming (Taylor, 2019), or the suspect's demeanor (Nix, Pickett, & Mitchell, 2019) -each of which might factor into an executive's assessment of the OIS and subsequent decision making. Future research should explore whether these factors play a role in executives' decision making as it relates to release of BWC footage.…”