Race and Worrying About Police Brutality: The Hidden Injuries of Minority Status in America
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
5-26-2020
Publication Title
Victims and Offenders
DOI
10.1080/15564886.2020.1767252
ISSN
1556-4991
Abstract
Given the historically contentious relationship – including most notably the use of excessive and lethal force – between the police and African Americans, the current project examines the extent to which Blacks in the United States fear police brutality. The study is based on a national-level survey (N = 1,000), and measures fear by how much respondents “worry” about experiencing police force. The data support the racial divide hypothesis, showing that Blacks’ worry about such violence is over five times that of Whites. Guided by the racial/ethnic gradient hypothesis, the analyses also assess Hispanic respondents’ level of worry. Rather than forming a gradient by falling midway between Blacks and Whites, Hispanics’ worry about police brutality more closely reflects those of Blacks at more than four times that of Whites, suggesting a racial/ethnic divide. These findings thus assert that worrying about police brutality is an emotional injury that minorities disproportionately experience and whose pervasiveness remains largely hidden from view.
Recommended Citation
Graham, Amanda, Murat Haner, Melissa M. Sloan, Francis T. Cullen, Teresa C. Kulig.
2020.
"Race and Worrying About Police Brutality: The Hidden Injuries of Minority Status in America."
Victims and Offenders, 15 (5): Taylor & Francis Online.
doi: 10.1080/15564886.2020.1767252
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/crimjust-criminology-facpubs/269
Comments
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