Date of Award
8-2023
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Psychology
Committee Chair/Advisor
Mary Anne Taylor
Committee Member
Zhuo Job Chen
Committee Member
Marissa Porter Shuffler
Committee Member
Fred Switze III
Abstract
While public outrage in response to excessive force is appropriate and understandable (e.g., Rodney King), there are also use-of-force instances which may be misconstrued as excessive by civilians due to a lack of understanding of the law, policies, and procedures for police use of force (UOF). This can lead to negative perceptions of police officers. This poses a threat to healthy police-community relations, as positive perceptions of the police are reliable predictors of compliance and voluntary cooperation with them (Choi, 2021). To balance overly negative perceptions of police who are following protocol and potentially increase the positivity of perceptions, this project aimed to develop and evaluate the effectiveness of an educational intervention that provides civilians with straightforward knowledge of the laws, policies, and practices for UOF. The project had two primary goals: (1) to assess the impact of a factual discussion of justifiable use of force (UOF) on knowledge of UOF and empathy toward police and (2) The impact of knowledge of UOF and an empathic perpective that encouraged identification with police on attitudes and empathy toward police. Results of Study 1 suggested that the use of the short factual discussion of UOF was not effective in changing knowledge of UOF or empathy for police. Results of Study 2 suggested that while knowledge of UOF had no impact on attitudes toward police, adopting an empathic perspective was effective in increasing empathy for police. Implications of these findings for interventions designed to enhance community-police relations are discussed.
Recommended Citation
Villanueva, Randle Aaron Molina, "“If I Was That Cop…”: Improving Attitudes Toward Police Through an Educational Intervention for Use-Of-Force Knowledge and Empathy" (2023). All Dissertations. 3394.
https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_dissertations/3394