Implicit Bias (2 questions)

How are implicit and explicit bias measured?

Explicit bias is typically measured by asking someone to identify their beliefs, implicit bias is measured in a more nuanced way.

What does the Implicit Association Test (IAT) measure?

The strength of associations between concepts and evaluations or stereotypes.

Explicit bias

The traditional conceptualization of bias Individuals are aware of their prejudices and attitudes toward certain groups. Positive or negative preferences for particular group are conscious. Overt racism and racist comments are examples of explicit biases

Oregon's definition of profiling encompass more than just race

and includes 12 other classifications

Metacognition

awareness of one's own knowledge -what one does and doesn't know- and one's ability to understand, control, and manipulate one's cognitive processes

Stereotypes

a belief (often negative) about individual characteristics generalized to all people within a group (cops like donuts).

What are three situations that increase the likelihood of bias?

1) Situations that involve discretionary activities 2) Situations that are ambiguous, and/or 3) Situations that are fast moving

Two Prong test

4th amendment -> Objective standard, Explicit information, individualized suspicion 14th amendment -> More subjective standard, refers to motivation

Oregon Profiling Laws: HB 2355 (2017)

Requires collection of certain data elements from officer-initiated pedestrian and officer-initiated traffic stops by all Oregon Law Enforcement Officers.

What are the most important legal constraints on proactive policing?

The 4th Amendment (protects against unreasonable search and seizure) The 14th Amendment (protects against governmental discrimination, the equal protection clause)

Oregon Profiling Laws: HB 2002 (2015)

Banned racial profiling by police and established procedures for complaints alleging profiling.

Contact theory (Engage with people)

Biases can be reduced through positive contact with members of other groups (stereotyped groups, outgroups)

Malleable

Easily influenced, pliable

Implicit bias

involves all of the subconscious feelings, perceptions, attitudes, and stereotypes that influence behavior. It is an automatic positive or negative preference for a group, based on one's subconscious thoughts. Doesn't require prejudice or hatred; it only requires knowledge of a stereotype to produce discriminatory actions.

How can we work on reducing and managing our biases?

Awareness Reduce Ambiguity Engage with people Tools

What are officer's decisions influenced by?

Biases that are operating outside of their conscious awareness

What do all individuals have that are outside of their conscious awareness?

Cognitive processes

Engage with people

Contact theory Expose yourself to counter stereotype

What HB 2355 Required Data to be tracked?

Date/Time/Location of Stop Race Ethnicity Age Sex Nature/reason for stop Disposition of stop (warning, citation, summons) Search conducted Type of search Search results Arrest made as a result of contact

Counter-Stereotyping

Exposing individuals to information that goes against their established attitudes in an attempt to alter them.

What is the difficulty in determining what is reasonable?

Increases with the ambiguity of the situation

"Easier done than undone"

Negative experiences with a particular social group carry more weight than positive experiences with the same group

Some ways to reduce ambiguity

Slow down the encounter (when feasible) Get more information Watch out for "profiling by proxy" Practice scenarios that force making split second decisions without being influenced by suspect characteristics Get to know the community you serve

Important points to know about implicit bias

The assumption that biased policing comes from "racist" police is incorrect Even good/well intentioned people have biases (because we are human) Biases impact what we perceive and can impact our decisions Through training, we can prevent bias from impacting our actions Training about bias is not about making officers less safe

What is the goal for both training modalities?

To increase fairness in officer decision making, and ultimately to enhance the outcomes of police-citizen encounters.

Threat Perception Failures (TPF) occur when

an officer responds to a perceived deadly threat, and yet their perception of the situation doesn't reflect the facts of the situation.

Bias

is a human trait resulting from our tendency and need to classify individuals into categories as we strive to quickly process information and make sense of the world

Explicit bias definition

made up of attitudes, beliefs, and stereotypes that an individual "claims" as part of him or herself.

(Tools) Traditional classroom based training format

officers are presented with an informative lecture on the science of bias EX: fair and impartial policing, clear sight, principled policing

(Tools) Simulation based training

officers are presented with multiple scenarios in which the suspect demographics are unrelated to the outcome. The purpose is to "counter condition" officers' implicit associations that effect decision making EX: Counter bias Training Simulation

Proactive policing

policing strategies that police organizations develop and implement with the intent to prevent and reduce crime (before it occurs) and differ from traditional reactive approaches in policing which respond to crime once it has occurred.

Implicit bias definition

subtle and largely unconscious or semi-conscious attitudes that influence behavior