Utility Value: Police Officer Responsiveness And

Utility Value. Police officers should understand the value of implicit bias awareness and de-escalation strategies to improve officer responsiveness and communication with underrepresented minorities. As Eccles (2009) points out, individuals are more easily engaged in an endeavor when that endeavor provides value to them. Police officers better connect to the objective, such as the value of understanding implicit bias, when they find personal meaning and importance to a task or outcome. Utility value helps individuals to focus on the benefit of finishing the task (Clark & Estes, 2008). Additionally, utility value allows parties to justify enduring something they do not like for the benefit of the end goal. An individual’s values connect

In goal orientation theory, expectations and outcomes need to connect to an individual's personal goals (Eccles, 2006). Police officers should want to do more to increase effectiveness with the underrepresented population and go beyond traditional ways of interacting with underrepresented populations, which limits inclusion and increases adverse behavior and discord between minoritized community members and police officers. Moreover, the atmosphere in which a person gains knowledge influences their goal orientation (Yough, and Anderman, 2006). The overarching objective of improving relationships with minoritized groups are less likely to occur without investigating and understanding implicit bias influence on officer behavior. Police officers need to consider the consequences of not investigating implicit bias. In addition, goal orientation is significant when adjusting one’s mindset to reach a group goal (Bandura, 2011). Among other concerns is the inadequate exposure to various cultures and lack of diversity among the officers and the organization as a whole, both which influence goal orientation. Although race is a consideration among the frontline officers, Bandura (1986) states that cultural beliefs develop from perceptions, and a person’s environment influences their

As data collection is not yet complete for this project, the organization influences in Table 3 represent the complete list of assumed organization influences and their probability of validity is based on the most frequently mentioned organization influences to achieving the stakeholders’ goal during informal interviews. Additionally, it is supported by the literature review and the review of organization and culture theory. Organizations may have the knowledge and motivating factors in place to make improvements, but organizational influences that contribute to institution deficiencies such as policies, procedures, and organizational culture also contribute to organizational performance