Title: Deadly decisions
Description: Numerous studies have demonstrated that racial bias exisits in the identification of weapons and in the decision to fire weapons. Research has shown that individuals are faster and more accurate in identifying handguns as weapons after seeing a Black face compared to after seeing a White face. In addition, it has been found that individuals shoot armed targets more quickly and more frequently when those targets are Black, rather than White. However, police officers tend not to show these biases (coined "shooter bias") that are frequently seen in civilian populations. One explanation for this inconsistency is that few studies mirror the true conditions under which this bias is likely to emerge in officers; that is conditions that are characterized by stress. This dissertation investigates shooter bias in police under conditions of stress and examines how maladaptive stress responses (threat responses measured physiologically) affect shooter bias. The hyposthesis that under threat states, police officers engage in shooter bias was tested in an experiment. Results indicated that the greater the experienced threat state, the more police officers shot armed Black targets. This effect was not observed when shooting armed White targets. In addition, the greater the experienced threat states, the more sensitive police officers were to the presence of a weapon when targets were Black.