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Simulators help prepare officers for worst-case scenarios in the field

Lois James
Lois James

Long before such officer-involved shootings as those in Ferguson, Missouri, and North Charleston, South Carolina, researchers at WSU’s Sleep and Performance Research Center were using a simulator to study officer-involved shootings.

Mount Vernon, Wash., Police Lt. Chris Cammock said he spoke earlier this month with Lois James, research assistant professor in the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology, about her research. Cammock hopes members of the Skagit Multiple Agency Response Team (SMART) may be able to visit the University’s deadly force simulator. » More …

WSU lab studies the science behind police shootings

Lois James
Lois James

The Spokane lab recreates simulations of actual officer-involved shootings to help improve police responses.

Inside an old warehouse on Washington State University’s Spokane campus, police officer Nick Briggs is being fitted with an imaging device to monitor what’s happening inside his brain as he makes life and death decisions. » More …

WSU ‘deadly force’ lab finds racial disparities in shootings

Lois James, left, and Bryan Vila
Lois James, left, and Bryan Vila

Participants in an innovative WSU study of deadly force were more likely to feel threatened in scenarios involving black people. But when it came time to shoot, participants were biased in favor of black suspects, taking longer to pull the trigger against them than against armed white or Hispanic suspects.

The findings, published in the recent Journal of Experimental Criminology, grow out of dozens of simulations aimed at explaining the disproportionate number of ethnic and racial minorities shot by police. The studies use the most advanced technology available, as participants with laser-equipped guns react to potentially threatening scenarios displayed in full-size, high-definition video.

Lois James and Bryan Vila, research professors in criminology and criminal justice at WSU Spokane, used a sophisticated “deadly force” simulator to analyze how police, military and the general public react in threatening situations.

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