Reducing Misconceptions and False Beliefs in Police and Criminal Psychology

Aamodt, Michael G.

doi:10.1177/0093854808321527

Cited by 19 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Snook also observed that ‘this is highly disconcerting because of the potential for severe consequences (e.g., miscarriages of justice) when pseudoscientific practices are employed by the police or when erroneous beliefs guide the consequential decision making that is inherent in police work’ (Snook, 2008, p. 1211). As stated by Aamodt (2008), it is disturbing ‘that not only are many of these beliefs not based on an empirical source, but many are perpetuated in spite of evidence to the contrary’ (p. 1231).…”

Section: Is the Behaviour Analysis Interview Just Common Sense?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Is the behaviour analysis interview just common sense?

Masip

Herrero

Garrido

et al. 2010

Appl. Cognit. Psychol.

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The Behaviour Analysis Interview (BAI) is an interview protocol developed by John E. Reid and Associates to generate different reactions in guilty and innocent suspects. Even though research has questioned the usefulness of the BAI protocol , many law enforcement officials are trained in the BAI every year. Two studies were conducted to examine whether the BAI recommendations are in line with lay participants' beliefs about the correlates of guilt or innocence. In Study 1, the participants read the transcriptions of two BAIs and had to indicate which one corresponded to the guilty suspect. Virtually all the participants who were familiar with the BAI protocol were successful in this task; however, more naïve participants (69%) than expected by chance were also able to identify the guilty interview. In Study 2, a questionnaire was designed to examine whether those behaviours that the BAI proponents maintain are guilt indicators were judged by lay participants as more indicative of guilt than those behaviours that the BAI proponents maintain that are indicators of innocence. The results strongly supported this prediction. Not only are the BAI recommendations inaccurate, but they are also in line with what people already believe. Apparently, little new can be learned by attending training seminars on the BAI. Law enforcement personnel should be taught interview protocols grounded on sound science instead of unsupported common-sense beliefs.

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Section: Is the Behaviour Analysis Interview Just Common Sense?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Is the behaviour analysis interview just common sense?

Masip

Herrero

Garrido

et al. 2010

Appl. Cognit. Psychol.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Such results are not surprising as metaanalyses and other research indicates that when it comes to a variety of issues ranging from personality profiles to suicide rates to the ability to detect deception, law enforcement personnel are similar to the general public (Aamodt 2008;Honig 2007).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 89%

“…For example, books by Jurkanin and Hillard (2006); Territo and Sewell (2007); Wells and Alt (2005) suggest higher than normal rates of divorce for police officers, and Aamodt (2008) reported finding the following statistics on the Internet: & Surveys of police officers continually reflect estimates of divorce rates as high as 75% & Police officers…have a high divorce rate, about second in the nation. & Compared to national averages, police officers have been reported to have…double the divorce rate… & Police officers, for example, face divorce rates averaging between 66 and 75 percent.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

A Comparison of Law Enforcement Divorce Rates with Those of Other Occupations

McCoy

Aamodt

2009

J Police Crim Psych

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It is a common belief that the divorce rate for police officers is higher than that of the general population. This belief is commonly held in spite of the fact that there is no empirical research supporting such a belief. To compare the divorce rate of law enforcement personnel with the rates for other occupations, we analyzed data from the 2000 U.S. Census. The results of this analysis indicate that the divorce rate for law enforcement personnel is lower than that of the general population, even after controlling for demographic and other job-related variables.

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“…As far as concerns police officers, they are also subject to cognitive biases and myths as everyone else (Aamodt, 2008;Saunders, 2012). Thus, we can expect that, because of the absence of research on CSA background information, they can hold false beliefs about the relation between these variables and CSA risk.…”

Section: Background Information In Csa Research and Investigationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Police Use of Background Information Related to Alleged Victims in Mock Evaluations of Child Sexual Abuse

Tadei¹,

Santtila²,

Antfolk³

2019

Preprint

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When statistically related to child sexual abuse (CSA), background information can assist decision-making in investigations of CSA allegations. Here, we studied the use of such background information among Finnish police officers. We analyzed their ability to identify and interpret CSA-related and -unrelated background information both when placed in mock scenarios and when presented as separate variables. We also measured the ability to correctly estimate the base-rate of CSA allegations being true based on such background information. In the context of mock scenarios, officers were better in discarding CSA-unrelated variables than in identifying CSA-related ones. Within-subject performance across different scenarios was, however, not consistent. When information was presented as separate variables, officers tended to incorrectly consider many CSA-unrelated variables as CSA-related. Officers performed well in recognizing whether CSA-related variables increase or decrease CSA risk. Finally, officers were inaccurate in identifying variables that are CSA-related only for boys or only for girls. When asked to estimate the CSA probability of mock scenarios, participants were accurate only in assessing low-probability cases, and this was not associated with the ability to identify CSA-related and -unrelated variables. We conclude that police officers would benefit from more training in using background information and from using available decision-making support tools in the context of investigating CSA allegations.

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Reducing Misconceptions and False Beliefs in Police and Criminal Psychology

Cited by 19 publications

References 11 publications

Is the behaviour analysis interview just common sense?

Is the behaviour analysis interview just common sense?

A Comparison of Law Enforcement Divorce Rates with Those of Other Occupations

The Police Use of Background Information Related to Alleged Victims in Mock Evaluations of Child Sexual Abuse

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