The Relationship Between Cumulative Stress, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Implicit Racial Bias, and Police Abuse of Power and the Resulting Lethal Force Incidents in Encounters with African American Subjects
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2023
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Abstract
The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between cumulative stress, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), implicit racial bias, and police abuse of power and their impact on law enforcement officers’ ability to accurately perceive threats, resulting in lethal force incidents in interactions with African American subjects. Stock et al. (1998) defines lethal force as “force which is likely to cause death or great bodily harm… (pg. 4).” Further, this study sought to determine how the four variables individually and collectively affect lethal force incidents. The hypothesis was implicit racial bias alone would not account for lethal force outcomes, further PTSD and/or cumulative stress must also be a part of the equation. One hundred and fifteen current or former law enforcement officers were surveyed to answer this question. Binary logistic regression was used to determine the existence of and strength of the relationship between variables. The analysis found the relationship between cumulative stress, police abuse of power, and lethal force incidents was statistically significant and both variables could reliably predict lethal force incidents. The study did not demonstrate a strong relationship between implicit racial bias and lethal force incidents, resulting in the need for further research to understand the role of race in these incidents when African American subjects are over 3x as likely to be killed in a lethal force incident than their Caucasian counterparts.
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Implicit Bias, Racial Bias, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Cumulative Stress, Law Enforcement, Lethal Force