Abstract

Racial Threat Theory posits that punitive attitudes are produced when Whites are alarmed by large or growing Black populations. While research has identified a relationship between Black composition and support from community members for more punitive criminal justice policy, no research has examined whether racial composition influences punitive attitudes among criminal justice personnel—even though they represent a key population that can engage in discrimination. This study advances our understanding of racial threat and police force by examining the relationship between Black population and punitive use-of-force attitudes on the part of police. Using survey and census data for approximately 10,000 police officers in 97 agencies, multilevel analyses reveal that officers report more punitive attitudes in jurisdictions with larger Black populations and that this relationship is concentrated among White police officers. The results provide evidence that racial disparities in police outcomes are at least partly driven by motivational criteria (such as discrimination).

摘要

种族威胁理论认为，当白人对大量或不断增长的黑人人口感到震惊时，就会产生惩罚态度。虽然研究已经确定了黑人构成与社区成员对更具惩罚性的刑事司法政策的支持之间的关系，但没有研究检验种族构成是否影响刑事司法人员的惩罚态度——尽管他们代表了可能参与歧视的关键人群。这项研究通过研究黑人人口与警察惩罚性使用武力态度之间的关系，增进了我们对种族威胁和警察部队的理解。使用 97 个机构约 10,000 名警察的调查和人口普查数据，多层次分析显示，在黑人人口较多的司法管辖区，警察报告了更多的惩罚态度，而且这种关系集中在白人警察中。结果证明，警察结果中的种族差异至少部分是由动机标准（例如歧视）驱动的。