Does de-escalation training work?
Research De-escalation training has been widely implemented by U.S. police agencies in the wake of adverse public reaction to recent controversial police use-of-force incidents. Despite vast promotion from politicians, academics, expert panels, and the public, we know little about the effects of de-...
| Authors: | ; ; |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2020
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| In: |
Criminology & public policy
Year: 2020, Volume: 19, Issue: 3, Pages: 721-759 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (Resolving-System) |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Keywords: |
| Summary: | Research De-escalation training has been widely implemented by U.S. police agencies in the wake of adverse public reaction to recent controversial police use-of-force incidents. Despite vast promotion from politicians, academics, expert panels, and the public, we know little about the effects of de-escalation training on officers and police-citizen interactions. In this article, we offer findings from a multidisciplinary systematic literature review that demonstrate limited knowledge concerning the impact of de-escalation training across all professions. We identified 64 de-escalation training evaluations conducted over a 40-year period, primarily in the fields of nursing and psychiatry. Policy Implications Although assessment outcomes reveal few adverse consequences and provide some confidence that de-escalation trainings lead to slight-to-moderate individual and organizational improvements, conclusions concerning the effectiveness of de-escalation training are limited by the questionable quality of almost all evaluation research designs. As such, important questions regarding the impact of de-escalation training for police remain. Given the critical impact that de-escalation training could have on officers and the public they serve, we conclude with a direct call to academics, practitioners, and funders across the field of policing to prioritize as soon as possible the testing of de-escalation and other police use-of-force policies, tactics, and training. |
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| ISSN: | 1745-9133 |
| DOI: | 10.1111/1745-9133.12467 |