483
Views
0
CrossRef citations to date
0
Altmetric
Research Article

Before and after George Floyd and Breonna Taylor: citizen perceptions of a ‘Reasonable Officer’Open DataOpen Materials

ORCID Icon, &
Received 28 Jul 2022, Accepted 30 Jul 2023, Published online: 16 Nov 2023
 

ABSTRACT

The extent to which the American ‘Black criminal’ stereotype and nonverbal cues of aggression influences community perceptions of citizen-officer interactions was examined. In three experiments, using a between-subjects, vignette-methodology depicting a domestic violence situation, participants (N = 838) read about a Black or White man displaying aggressive or nonaggressive nonverbal cues with a police officer. Participants rated aggression, subject and officer actions, and familiarity with cases involving Black Americans. Experiment 3 was conducted in July 2020 after the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor amid protests against police brutality. Aggressive displays by the vignette subject increased expectations of interpersonal violence between the subject and officer. The White man was perceived as more likely to aggress than the Black man (Exp 2 & 3). Case familiarity did not moderate perceptions (Exp 1 & 2); however, familiarity with George Floyd and Breonna Taylor (Exp 3) modified perceptions of the subject-officer interaction. Increased familiarity led to perceptions that the Black man was less of a threat than the White counterpart. Perceptions of a ‘reasonable officer’ are more complex and culturally driven than can be accounted for via stereotype activation. Implications for public perceptions of law enforcement and the justice system are considered.

Open Scholarship

This article has earned the Center for Open Science badges for Open Data and Open Materials through Open Practices Disclosure. The data and materials are openly accessible at https://osf.io/4mekn/;

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data supporting these findings are available from the corresponding author and through the Open Science Framework. There are no competing interests to declare and we confirm that there are no relevant financial or non-financial competing interests to report.

Notes

1 For Experiments 1 &2 data were collected before the death of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor.

Log in via your institution

Log in to Taylor & Francis Online

PDF download + Online access

  • 48 hours access to article PDF & online version
  • Article PDF can be downloaded
  • Article PDF can be printed
USD 53.00 Add to cart

Issue Purchase

  • 30 days online access to complete issue
  • Article PDFs can be downloaded
  • Article PDFs can be printed
USD 199.00 Add to cart

* Local tax will be added as applicable

Related Research

People also read lists articles that other readers of this article have read.

Recommended articles lists articles that we recommend and is powered by our AI driven recommendation engine.

Cited by lists all citing articles based on Crossref citations.
Articles with the Crossref icon will open in a new tab.