The longstanding question of whether police are racially biased was put front and center by the events in Ferguson, Missouri in August 2014—and, more recently, by those in Baton Rouge and Falcon Heights. The national turmoil has left police agencies and community leaders searching for answers. For example, at this week’s Democratic Convention, the “Mothers of the Movement” appealed to voters to help find solutions to remedy the broken relationship between cops and communities. The social psychologists who study human bias and prejudice, I believe, can provide us with some very useful ones.

The important key is that we describe the importance of high-quality use-of-force training based on the science of bias. We are also linking to a Police Chief article co-authored by Lois James and Dr. Fridell, Implicit Bias versus the “Ferguson Effect”. It covers implicit bias, her “counter bias” studies and discusses the implications for training.

Read the full “Can Better Training Solve Cops’ Implicit Biases?” article here

Read the “Implicit Bias versus the “Ferguson Effect”” article here