Police Shootings and Race in the United States: Why the Perpetrator Predation Perspective Is Essential to I-O Psychology's Role in Ending This Crisis

Bergman, Mindy E.

doi:10.1017/iop.2017.101

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…In terms of changing the ideology of how we think about law enforcement and officer use of force requires shifting the conversation. Bergman (2018) described how we need to change the way we think about and discuss police shootings. To move from the victim precipitation model (asking what the victim did) to the predator predation framework (inquiring about officer behavior) which can result in recommending different solutions instead of normalizing victims as blameful and perpetrators as blameless.…”

Section: Overview Of Police Violence and The Importance Of Scholarly Activismmentioning

confidence: 99%

The racialized patterns of police violence: The critical importance of research as praxis

Durán

Shroulote-Durán

2021

Sociology Compass

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The tragic killing of George Floyd at the hands of the police resulted in hundreds of thousands of protestors marching in the streets demanding change. The call for change criticized the killing of Blacks by law enforcement and challenged White supremacy as an institution of social control and racial violence. A key component of the marches and protests was a message to the residents of the United States: “Black Lives Matter.” As society grapples with a reckoning, researchers studying police violence for the past 6 decades have been empirically and theoretically debating the reasons why use of force by law enforcement continues to have a higher proportion of Black and Brown victims compared to Whites. Although the research on fatal police killings was studied by only a small number of individuals prior to 2014, after the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri the research in different areas of the country increased rapidly as did the forms of analysis and research disciplines making their own contributions. The Washington Post and Guardian news agencies established that deaths at the hands of the police were occurring for at least 900 to 1100 individual deaths per year for which firearms resulted in the greatest cause of death. As US government agencies failed to produce a national data source on police involved killings, the media took a leading role in providing greater national understanding. The authors examine what role academic researchers contribute to the discussion for solutions, particularly those from marginalized backgrounds. As protestors march, lawyers sue and defend, and politicians create new forms of legislation, researchers need to play a more important role initiating critical studies, making sense of the data, and providing a theoretical framework for which police violence can be understood. This article will provide an overview of the literature on racialized police violence, point out key patterns involving racial and ethnic disparities, and emphasize how researchers can play a more important role in advocating for change.

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Section: Overview Of Police Violence and The Importance Of Scholarly Activismmentioning

confidence: 99%

The racialized patterns of police violence: The critical importance of research as praxis

Durán

Shroulote-Durán

2021

Sociology Compass

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“…As an example, it is clear that Black men make more money per hour than Black women, but both make less than White women, who make less than White men. Yet when considering police shootings, it is clear that Black men are at significantly greater risk than Black women, White women, and White men (Bergman, 2018). This "reversal of (mis)fortunes" for Black men and Black women cannot be accounted for in simple additive or multiplicative models of intersections of demographic characteristics.…”

Section: Part Dmentioning

confidence: 99%

Recommendation: Add a competency on diversity and inclusion

Liu

Bergman

Hernandez

2020

Ind. Organ. Psychol.

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The focal article by Köhler et al. (2020) is an excellent start to a discussion about how we prepare reviewers for peer review in our journals and beyond. Our response has little disagreement with what is present in the focal article. Instead, we focus on what is omitted: a competency regarding diversity and inclusion (D&I). To that end, we describe a proposed competency, explain why it is important, and provide several examples regarding how this competency might play out in review of manuscripts and in other review settings. Why is a competency for diversity and inclusion necessary? Research in the industrial and organizational (I-O) domain is not representative of the labor market (Bergman & Jean, 2016) and tends to focus on the experiences of workers in the U.S. workforce, overlooking experiences from around the world (Myers, 2016). Despite the fact that many of our samples are college-educated individuals (e.g., undergraduates, professionals, managers, executives; Bergman & Jean, 2016), 38.6% of the U.S. workforce did not have any education beyond high school in 2018 (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2019). In order to remain relevant, interesting, more generalizable, and more applicable, work in the field of I-O psychology needs to consider issues related to class, job type, educational level, international status, and beyond. A competency in diversity (i.e., ways that individuals are different and unique, including the constructs of race, gender, religion, age, nationality, sexual orientation, ability status, parental status, class, education, and beyond; Jordan, 2011) and inclusion (i.e., fostering a climate that allows for diverse individuals to collaborate and connect; Jordan, 2011) would help I-O psychology research become more representative of the labor force, which should in turn make I-O psychology research more applicable and useful to organizations. Notably, we are arguing for competency in D&I issues in all I-O psychology research, not just in the D&I subfield. As scientists, we need to consider whether our research is responsive and responsible to issues of D&I in the domains of interest. Additionally, we need to address the issue of our own privilege (in terms of level of education, access to resources, etc.) and bias, as well as the privilege of those who have been included in I-O research (white collar, educated, White workers) and the biases that exist in our knowledge base. Confronting this privilege is uncomfortable and can be an area of uncertainty for individuals who are unfamiliar with issues related to D&I. The establishment of a formalized competency related to D&I helps alleviate some of this discomfort. The proposed competency for diversity and inclusion A competency for D&I belongs in the foundational knowledge area of the framework and would read something like this:

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Why is training the only answer?

Hernandez

Bergman

Liu

2020

Ind. Organ. Psychol.

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Industrial and organizational (I-O) psychologists love proposing training-if only we could get the right training!-to solve problems of harassment and discrimination (Hayes et al., 2020; Medeiros & Griffith, 2019). In their focal article, Hayes et al. call training a "natural starting point" (2020, 120). However, we contend here-as we have before (Bergman, 2018, 2019; Bergman et al., 2016)-that training will not solve the problem. It might contribute to a reduction in the problem, but it is not the panacea that I-O psychologists believe it would be. The suggestion that even the ideal antiharassment and antidiscrimination training is effective for everyone is questionable. The reality is that people are shaped to a large degree by the society in which they live, and some cannot simply be trained out of their biases and behaviors. Organizations can minimize the necessity for such training by reconceptualizing the minimum qualifications for adequate job performance to include the interpersonal skills that support an inclusive environment in which everyone has an equal opportunity to succeed. Many of these knowledge, skills, abilities, and other characteristics (KSAOs) would likely be applicable across positions, as certain attitudes and behaviors are generalizable. Therefore, this commentary provides an alternative view to Hayes et al. (2020), arguing that we should consider the many other tools that I-O psychologists have that could help reduce harassment and discrimination in organizations, specifically (a) competency modeling, (b) selection, (c) recruitment, (d) performance management and appraisal, and (e) policy analysis. No one tool will be the magic wand that ends harassment and discrimination (Bergman, 2019; Sackett & Shewach, 2017). Rather, we contend that using all of our tools, rather than just training, is more likely to bring about change. Note that herein we refer to harassment and discrimination and not just sexual harassment and racial discrimination, as did Hayes et al. (2020). Understandably, Hayes et al. narrowed their topics in order to provide a comprehensive literature review and focused on the specific forms of harassment and discrimination for which there is more training research. However, because we are writing about general processes, this was not necessary for us to do. Further, because intersectionality theory (Crenshaw, 1989; Purdie-Vaughns & Eibach, 2008; Settles, 2006) indicates that systems of oppression are linked, singling out specific kinds of harassment and discrimination as being in need of reduction-and remaining silent in the face of others-is less effective than addressing any and all harassment and discrimination. Finally, in some places we will discuss reducing harassment and discrimination, whereas in others we will discuss increasing diversity and inclusion (D&I); we consider the former to be an important subset of the latter.

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Police Shootings and Race in the United States: Why the Perpetrator Predation Perspective Is Essential to I-O Psychology's Role in Ending This Crisis

Cited by 3 publications

References 8 publications

The racialized patterns of police violence: The critical importance of research as praxis

The racialized patterns of police violence: The critical importance of research as praxis

Recommendation: Add a competency on diversity and inclusion

Why is training the only answer?

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