Encyclopedia of Psychology and Law

Practical examinations involve evaluation of perfor-

mance on hands-on or scenario-based tasks. For exam-

ple, a police trainer evaluates an officer’s performance

on an interactive computer-simulated enforcement task

that requires the officer to respond to a suspect who

is actively resisting arrest. The trainer evaluates the

extent to which the officer’s response and decision

making reflect endorsed training practices, accepted

legal principles, and approved police policies.

At the training program level, evaluating the effec-

tiveness of a program is a challenging and expensive

task that requires cooperation at all levels of the

police organization. Carrying out a program evalua-

tion requires knowledge and skills in social science

research and statistical methodology. Police psychol-

ogists (or other social scientists) who have knowledge

of the police culture are the ones most likely to evalu-

ate a police-training program. They may do a utilization-

focused evaluation, which is a comprehensive

approach that focuses on the intended use of the train-

ing program by intended users. Major evaluation

activities are describing the training program and

evaluating its process, outcomes, and utilization. Not

all police-training programs are subjected to evalua-

tion or are worth evaluating, especially poorly

designed ones. Police administrators and trainers

make informed program decisions, however, when

they use outcomes from what evaluators do measure.

Frank J. Gallo

See alsoPolice Psychologists; Police Psychology;

Police Selection

Further Readings

Haberfeld, M. R. (2002). Critical issues in police training.

Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Patton, M. Q. (1997). Utilization-focused evaluation: The

new century text(3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

White, E. K., & Honig, A. L. (1995). The role of the police

psychologist in training. In M. I. Kurke & E. M. Scrivner

(Eds.),Police psychology into the 21st century

(pp. 257–277). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

POLICEUSE OFFORCE

Police use of force is the application in a law enforce-

ment capacity of physical or psychological coercion

against citizens. Under the law, police officers have

the authority to use force for enforcing laws, prevent-

ing criminal activity, defending others, and defending

themselves. They have the discretionary power to use

different degrees of force against citizens who choose

to violate the law. Forceful responses can range from

officer presence to the use of weapons. One approach

to understanding forceful responses against citizens is

psychological. There is psychological knowledge

bearing on (a) how officers formulate and carry out

their decisions to use force by encoding situational

information, making a decision to act, developing a

plan of action, and initiating action; (b) how officers’

involvement in a force situation puts them at risk of

experiencing stress that causes unfavorable changes in

their perception and memory; (c) how police candi-

dates with particular personality traits are at risk of

on-the-job problems with using force; and (d) how

officers whose job-related experiences involve trau-

matic force situations are vulnerable to developing

behaviors that lead to the use of excessive force.

Decision Making

An officer formulates and carries out a decision to use

force against a citizen by encoding situational infor-

mation, making a decision to act, developing a plan of

action, and initiating action.

Encoding Situational Information. Encoding is a

process in which the officer attends to situational con-

ditions. It involves the sensory register, the first struc-

ture of the officer’s memory system. The sensory register

is responsible for registering all features of the force

situation through sensory functions—for example,

seeing a citizen holding a gun, hearing a gunshot, and

smelling gunfire. Sensory systems keep the officer

informed about the force situation. They extract infor-

mation and convert it to electrical impulses that travel

to the thalamus, which is located in the diencephalon

of the brain. The thalamus directs sensory input to

associated cortex areas of the brain, where the officer

becomes aware of sensation and interprets it.

Making a Decision to Act.Making a decision to act

takes place in the officer’s short-term memory. The

officer consciously discriminates, selects, and attends

to sensations that are most dangerous, while reducing

attention to less dangerous information. The officer

considers the magnitude of the force situation and the

probability of harm occurring if he or she takes no

protective or enforcement action. What researchers

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