One in five US police have anti-Black bias
Research finds that one in five US police have anti-Black bias
Researchers at the University of Miami looked into the key question:
How pervasive is racial bias among police, specifically?
Sociologist Jomills H. Braddock II, Recent graduate Rachel Lautenschlager; Alex Piquero, chair of the Department of Sociology and Arts and Sciences Distinguished Scholar; and Nicole Leeper Piquero, professor of sociology and associate dean, together tried to answer that question.
One in five officers show high levels of pro-white or anti-Black bias
Piquero says that the answer should give everybody pause. Their survey of the Implicit Association Test (IAT) results of 4.8 million adults, including 8,000 police officers, gave them a rich source of data.
This is not a study that calls a sample of 100 or 200, or ignores widespread attitudes in society. They found that almost one of every five officers exhibit high levels of implicit pro-white or anti-Black bias. That is the kind of bias that lies shallow under the surface of decision making, unknown or hardly noticed by an officer. This kind of bias can happen to anybody but becomes especially dangerous in the mindset of a person making life or death decisions.
However, when looking at explicit or conscious bias, the team found that number did not change as much as they expected it to – one in eight officers were openly racially biased, either pro-white or anti-Black again. This is the kind of bias that sits firmly on the surface, acknowledged, and accepted.
‘Higher levels of bias than members of the public’
What about Black law enforcement officers?