Presenter: Daniel Blumberg, Ph.D.
Psychologists have a rather unique skillset to facilitate better relationships between members of the community and the police. This requires the approach of a family therapist who conceptualizes problems systemically. Rather than focusing attention on the identified patient (IP), the family therapist strategically intervenes without alienating the parents by blaming them for the IP’s difficulties. The family therapist also intervenes without colluding with the parents or intimating that the system’s problems are the fault of the IP. Excellent clinicians do this even with unlikeable clients; to be effective, we reframe the problem and remain empathetic.
There are multiple access points for psychologists to make a difference. This workshop focuses on ways in which psychologists can serve as a bridge between community members and the police. The first fifteen minutes will present some information about police hiring and training, which explains the insidious role of moral disengagement, as well as some information about other moral risks of policing, which leave many officers emotionally and spiritually depleted, such as compassion fatigue, moral distress, and emotional exhaustion.
Following this, depending on the number of attendees (in small groups or all together), attendees will generate strategies for psychologists to foster a more trauma-informed perspective in the ways in which community members and police officers interact with each other. The goal is to reduce the dehumanization that occurs on both sides. Additionally, attendees will develop solutions to eliminate “us versus them” attitudes which currently pervade the community and policing. Attendees will be guided to consider ways to increase positive exposure between community members and police officers with the goal of balancing availability heuristics with more positive belief/expectations. If time allows, the attendees will consider ways to increase the number of members from underserved communities applying to become police officers and what law enforcement agencies can do to attract candidates from these communities to apply.
This workshop encourages attendees to consider a quote that is often attributed to William James: “A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.” At the conclusion, it is expected that attendees will recognize ways to help community members and police officers to think about each other with less interference from their respective prejudices about each other.
Learning Objectives
Participants will be able to:
1. Understand the ways in which police training fosters moral disengagement.
2. Examine ways in which police training can increase psychological skills of emotion regulation and procedural justice.
3. Identify ways in which psychologists can take a more active role in improving relations between community members and the police.
RESOURCES
Note: An asterisk denotes the availability of the full-text article on Eventleaf.
*Blumberg, D. M., Papazoglou, K., & Schlosser, M. D. (2020). Organizational Solutions to the Moral Risks of Policing. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17(20).
*Blumberg, D. M., Schlosser, M. D., Papazoglou, K., Creighton, S., & Kaye, C. C. (2019). New Directions in Police Academy Training: A Call to Action. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 16(24).
*Papazoglou, K., Blumberg, D.M., Collins, P.I., Schlosser, M.D. and Bonanno, G.A. (2020). Inevitable Loss and Prolonged Grief in Police Work: An Unexplored Topic. Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 1178. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.01178
Tuttle, B. M., Blumberg, D M., & Papazoglou, K. (2019, April). Critical challenges to police officer wellness. In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Criminology and Criminal Justice, ed. Henry Pontell. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.