skip to main content


Title: Camera Point-of-View Exacerbates Racial Bias in Viewers of Police Use of Force Videos
Abstract The implementation of body-worn cameras (BWC) by policing agencies has received widespread support from many individuals, including citizens and police officers. Despite their increasing prevalence, little is known about how the point-of-view (POV) of these cameras affects perceptions of viewers. In this research, we investigate how POV interacts with skin color of citizens in police use of force videos to affect perceptions of procedural justice. In an experimental study, participants watched eight police use of force videos—half recorded from BWC and half from an onlooker’s perspective—in which skin tone of the citizen varied. Results indicate that POV interacts with citizen skin tone such that, compared to the onlooker perspective, the BWC exacerbated viewer racial bias against dark skin tone citizens. Furthermore, identification with the police officer fully mediated this relationship. Results are discussed in relation to media theory and practical implications.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1735095
NSF-PAR ID:
10290695
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Journal of Communication
Volume:
71
Issue:
2
ISSN:
0021-9916
Page Range / eLocation ID:
246 to 275
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. null (Ed.)
    Purpose The purpose of this paper is to understand citizens' perceptions of smartphone-based city management apps and to identify facilitators and barriers that influence app adoption and use. An aim is to identify how current technology adoption theories might be expanded and enriched for studying citizen adoption of city apps in the US. Design/methodology/approach This paper presents a qualitative exploratory case study of citizen perceptions of city management apps in Tallahassee, a top-ranked digital city in the southeastern United States. The authors derive empirical data from focus group discussions with citizens using thematic analysis. Findings Overall, the findings suggest that city management apps are primarily perceived and used by citizens as handy and efficient tools for the provision of information and public services. The findings suggest that current technology adoption and use models applied to citizen adoption of m-government may benefit by being expanded for the US context. Originality/value This paper highlights what factors of m-government technology are effective, useful or inhibiting in citizens' lives from the perspective of a group of citizens in the southeastern US. Implications that might be learned for researchers and practitioners are discussed. 
    more » « less
  2. This article employs a sociomaterial perspective adapted from information systems and management studies to examine the potential impact of body worn cameras (BWCs) on police organisations. Based on 42 semi-structured interviews with police employees, the study illustrates how wearable camera technology is seen to ‘afford’ officers and agencies the ability to modify their work routines. Further, these modifications occur in conjunction with particular dimensions of body camera system’s material agency. Through the performativity of video recording devices to move, see, hear, and record, officers report altering how they approach patrol work by displacing certain tasks onto their material associates, which allows them to better carry out their duties. Through the interoperability of the cloud storage systems, departments describe being able to reorganise critical information processing routines in support of criminal prosecutions. Through the objectivity of the digital files produced by body-worn camera systems, departments note effortlessly creating packets of events bearing the impression of truth and legitimacy with which they are able to more easily resolve citizen complaints. These findings underscore the importance of remaining attentive to the materiality of technology in policing and law enforcement research. 
    more » « less
  3. Automated journalism technology is transforming news production and changing how audiences perceive the news. As automated text-generation models advance, it is important to understand how readers perceive human-written and machine-generated content. This study used OpenAI’s GPT-2 text-generation model (May 2019 release) and articles from news organizations across the political spectrum to study participants’ reactions to human- and machine-generated articles. As participants read the articles, we collected their facial expression and galvanic skin response (GSR) data together with self-reported perceptions of article source and content credibility. We also asked participants to identify their political affinity and assess the articles’ political tone to gain insight into the relationship between political leaning and article perception. Our results indicate that the May 2019 release of OpenAI’s GPT-2 model generated articles that were misidentified as written by a human close to half the time, while human-written articles were identified correctly as written by a human about 70 percent of the time. 
    more » « less
  4. Consent-based searches are by far the most ubiquitous form of search undertaken by police. A key legal inquiry in these cases is whether consent was granted voluntarily. This Essay suggests that fact finders’ assessments of voluntariness are likely to be impaired by a systematic bias in social perception. Fact finders are likely to underappreciate the degree to which suspects feel pressure to comply with police officers’ requests to perform searches. In two preregistered laboratory studies, we approached a total of 209 participants (“Experiencers”) with a highly intrusive request: to unlock their password-protected smartphones and hand them over to an experimenter to search through while they waited in another room. A separate 194 participants (“Forecasters”) were brought into the lab and asked whether a reasonable person would agree to the same request if hypothetically approached by the same researcher. Both groups then reported how free they felt, or would feel, to refuse the request. Study 1 found that whereas most Forecasters believed a reasonable person would refuse the experimenter’s request, most Experiencers—100 out of 103 people—promptly unlocked their phones and handed them over. Moreover, Experiencers reported feeling significantly less free to refuse than did Forecasters contemplating the same situation hypothetically. Study 2 tested an intervention modeled after a commonly proposed reform of consent searches, in which the experimenter explicitly advises participants that they have the right to withhold consent. We found that this advisory did not significantly reduce compliance rates or make Experiencers feel more free to say no. At the same time, the gap between Experiencers and Forecasters remained significant. These findings suggest that decision makers judging the voluntariness of consent consistently underestimate the pressure to comply with intrusive requests. This is problematic because it indicates that a key justification for suspicionless consent searches—that they are voluntary—relies on an assessment that is subject to bias. The results thus provide support to critics who would like to see consent searches banned or curtailed, as they have been in several states. The results also suggest that a popular reform proposal—requiring police to advise citizens of their right to refuse consent—may have little effect. This corroborates previous observational studies that find negligible effects of Miranda warnings on confession rates among interrogees, and little change in rates of consent once police start notifying motorists of their right to refuse vehicle searches. We suggest that these warnings are ineffective because they fail to address the psychology of compliance. The reason people comply with police, we contend, is social, not informational. The social demands of police-citizen interactions persist even when people are informed of their rights. It is time to abandon the myth that notifying people of their rights makes them feel empowered to exercise those rights. 
    more » « less
  5. Abstract

    This research examines how individual preferences for the major functions of stream restoration processes are associated with flood prevention and risk mitigation in Johnson Creek of Portland, Oregon, USA. We first reviewed a set of results from an analytical hierarchy process (AHP) model to rank the major stream restoration functions and compared citizens' preferences for “flood prevention” using ordinary least squares regression. Our results show that the perceptions and interests of citizens may be centred on the inconvenience of everyday life arising from the previous flood events. Residents in the highly urbanized downstream regions showed a higher sensitivity to flooding than those living in the upper regions of the watershed. Community participation and annual incomes are positively related to flood risk perception in more developed downstream regions, while ecological or development goals associated with property protection are positively associated with higher flood risk perception in the less developed upper regions. Our findings of citizen perceptions can be adopted to help local government leaders and households mitigate flood risk while also achieving multiple benefits from stream restoration projects.

     
    more » « less