Do police officers who are highly adept at dealing with violent situations visually assess potentially threatening scenes in a different way than less skillful officers? Studies of the “eye movements and gaze control patterns” of professional vs. amateur athletes suggest that may be the case, and a unique research project just launched by the Force...Read More
Dr. Anthony Pinizzotto, a forensic psychologist who has been a senior scientist at the FBI’s prestigious Behavioral Science Unit at Quantico, VA, has joined the Force Science Research Center, where initially he will help coordinate studies related to officer communications under high stress and to OIS investigations. Well-known in law enforcement circles, Pinizzotto was lead...Read More
You wouldn’t expect a spin-off of National Geographic magazine to have much content related to officer survival, but the August issue of National Geographic Adventure delivers just that in a surprising 1-2 punch. First is an article about how sudden fear and stress affect perception and performance, which draws largely from studies of street officers...Read More
A one-stop source of information on what officers, trainers, investigators and administrators need to know about the effects of stress on performance and memory in critical incidents is now available for download by clicking here. The report, 24 pages and nearly 12,000 words long, is a comprehensive and thoroughly documented summary of the latest research...Read More
How would you rank the relative risk for officers and suspects suffering injury from these 5 force options: Empty-hand control techniques Baton OC spray Conducted energy weapons (Tasers) Lateral vascular neck restraint. If you judged OC to be the “safest” and baton to be “most injurious” to both officers and offenders, you’re in agreement with...Read More
Part 2 of a 2-part series [Editor’s note: In our last transmission, we reported on a new documentary film, “The Pain Behind the Badge,” which features 3 officers who experienced emotional melt-downs from the cumulative stress of life on the street. Two contemplated suicide and the third saw the near-dissolution of his marriage before they...Read More
Part 1 of a 2-part series A few hours earlier, Sgt. Clarke Paris, a veteran of 22 years on the Las Vegas Metro Police, had finished a shift on which he’d responded to 5 suicide calls, the victims ranging from a 70-year-old man to a 13-year-old boy. Now he was lazily floating with his wife...Read More
A first-of-its-kind, case-by-case study of in-custody deaths associated with TASER use has confirmed that the popular electronic control devices are by no means the dangerous and often deadly weapons that Amnesty International, the ACLU and media reports frequently suggest. Self-described as “kind of a nerd” who approaches tedious research as recreation, Chief Howard Williams of...Read More
If you’re a patrol officer who’s first on the scene of an active-shooter call, should you make immediate entry in hunt for the suspect…or wait for other early responders and improvise a rapid deployment team? Since the Columbine massacre 9 years ago, few if any trainers any longer advocate delaying for a formal SWAT call-out,...Read More
Force Science students put their knowledge to use Part 2 of a 2-part series In Part 1 of this series we discussed the Force Science Certification course that was recently held in London, England. As part of that class, those who pursued certificates of completion were required to take a written test and participate in...Read More
