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Smarter interviews may reduce racial tension
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John Hawks is a professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
precautionary approach suggests biodiversity could dip more than 10 per cent before being unsafe. On the other hand, the situation may be worse, as some of the most vital ecosystem functions are in biomes where data is sparse but sensitivity to species loss may be very high, such as tundra. Clearly, we need to refine this planetary boundary. But even if it is not perfect, it is all we have, and we should worry deeply about breaching it so widely. n Georgina Mace is professor of biodiversity and ecosystems at University College London
INSIGHT Police shootings
LAURA BUCKMAN/AFP/Getty Images
He concluded that natural selection was at work on those variants, albeit slowly. Its impact is equal to a decline in attainment amounting to a month and a half less school per generation, and is swamped by other factors driving up attainment at the same time. Of course, Beauchamp’s study only covers a limited sample of US citizens. In addition, participants could be women aged 45 or men in their early 50s, which seems too young to judge lifetime reproduction. It’s also possible that the number of grandchildren or great-grandchildren is a better measure of fitness. However, it is not outlandish to imagine that natural selection may still be acting in this way, given the pace of change. In 1940, only a quarter of adults born in the US finished high school. By 2000, this was nearly 90 per cent. Our distant ancestors never knew environments where it made sense to delay reproduction to reap the rewards of an extended education. Education policy may be doing more than shaping tomorrow’s workforce. It may be shaping the course of our evolution. n
–Protests are sweeping the US–
Smarter interviews may reduce racial tension Conor Gearin
officers as a result. Too often, police officers are sent out with insufficient information. The problem starts when dispatchers don’t ask witnesses the best questions, says Vickie Mays at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA). “We’re not priming people to look for anything beyond saying what the person’s skin colour is.” People who have just seen a crime don’t always know which details are relevant. So asking closed questions like: “Did the suspect have light or dark skin?” doesn’t yield useful information. It may even play a role in racial
THE US is boiling over. Protests are sweeping the country after the latest in a string of police shootings of black men: Philando Castile in Minnesota and Alton Sterling in Louisiana. Shortly after, a sniper killed five police officers in Dallas, reportedly telling police he was targeting white officers. Three more officers were killed in Baton Rouge this week. In the wake of these tragedies, debates are raging about racial profiling and police brutality. These huge, systemic problems will require sweeping changes. But there are smaller measures that, while “We’re not priming people they won’t stop the shooting, might to look for anything over time have far-reaching effects. For example, why was Castile pulled beyond saying what the person’s skin colour is” over in the first place? According to audio from the officer’s call to the dispatcher, the description he had profiling. According to a 2013 study by been given was to look for a robbery the US Department of Justice, police suspect with a “wide-set nose”. are 31 per cent more likely to stop Much ink has been spilled over the black drivers than white drivers and role of police training and the extent more than twice as likely to search to which it affects behaviour and them. Republican senator Tim Scott attitudes. Less visible is the role of recently described being pulled over the person answering the phone seven times in one year. to emergency calls and dispatching “What did the suspect look like?” can
elicit better information. Dispatchers could follow up by asking witnesses to focus on more specific characteristics – speech patterns, jewellery, tattoos – to give patrolling cops more to go on. This open-question technique forms part of a strategy called the cognitive interview, pioneered by Edward Geiselman also at UCLA. Other tricks include asking the witness to describe the scene first in chronological order, then backwards, which can trigger further recollections. Geiselman and colleagues described the technique in 1984. Field tests showed that it held up: detectives using cognitive interviews in Florida in 1989 and England in 1996 elicited 63 per cent and 55 per cent more information from witnesses, respectively. But this method has limitations – it may be difficult with an agitated emergency caller on the line, and some aspects are time consuming. Still, elements of the technique could help. Dispatchers could be trained to talk to callers in a way designed to calm them and prime them for more accurate recall. No one has yet studied whether the cognitive interview can specifically rein in racial profiling. Still, anything that provides better information can hopefully help lessen the effects of institutional racism. Better interviews won’t stop people dying, but if institutional racism arises one decision at a time, perhaps it is vulnerable to death by a thousand cuts. n 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 19
John Hawks is a professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
precautionary approach suggests biodiversity could dip more than 10 per cent before being unsafe. On the other hand, the situation may be worse, as some of the most vital ecosystem functions are in biomes where data is sparse but sensitivity to species loss may be very high, such as tundra. Clearly, we need to refine this planetary boundary. But even if it is not perfect, it is all we have, and we should worry deeply about breaching it so widely. n Georgina Mace is professor of biodiversity and ecosystems at University College London
INSIGHT Police shootings
LAURA BUCKMAN/AFP/Getty Images
He concluded that natural selection was at work on those variants, albeit slowly. Its impact is equal to a decline in attainment amounting to a month and a half less school per generation, and is swamped by other factors driving up attainment at the same time. Of course, Beauchamp’s study only covers a limited sample of US citizens. In addition, participants could be women aged 45 or men in their early 50s, which seems too young to judge lifetime reproduction. It’s also possible that the number of grandchildren or great-grandchildren is a better measure of fitness. However, it is not outlandish to imagine that natural selection may still be acting in this way, given the pace of change. In 1940, only a quarter of adults born in the US finished high school. By 2000, this was nearly 90 per cent. Our distant ancestors never knew environments where it made sense to delay reproduction to reap the rewards of an extended education. Education policy may be doing more than shaping tomorrow’s workforce. It may be shaping the course of our evolution. n
–Protests are sweeping the US–
Smarter interviews may reduce racial tension Conor Gearin
officers as a result. Too often, police officers are sent out with insufficient information. The problem starts when dispatchers don’t ask witnesses the best questions, says Vickie Mays at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA). “We’re not priming people to look for anything beyond saying what the person’s skin colour is.” People who have just seen a crime don’t always know which details are relevant. So asking closed questions like: “Did the suspect have light or dark skin?” doesn’t yield useful information. It may even play a role in racial
THE US is boiling over. Protests are sweeping the country after the latest in a string of police shootings of black men: Philando Castile in Minnesota and Alton Sterling in Louisiana. Shortly after, a sniper killed five police officers in Dallas, reportedly telling police he was targeting white officers. Three more officers were killed in Baton Rouge this week. In the wake of these tragedies, debates are raging about racial profiling and police brutality. These huge, systemic problems will require sweeping changes. But there are smaller measures that, while “We’re not priming people they won’t stop the shooting, might to look for anything over time have far-reaching effects. For example, why was Castile pulled beyond saying what the person’s skin colour is” over in the first place? According to audio from the officer’s call to the dispatcher, the description he had profiling. According to a 2013 study by been given was to look for a robbery the US Department of Justice, police suspect with a “wide-set nose”. are 31 per cent more likely to stop Much ink has been spilled over the black drivers than white drivers and role of police training and the extent more than twice as likely to search to which it affects behaviour and them. Republican senator Tim Scott attitudes. Less visible is the role of recently described being pulled over the person answering the phone seven times in one year. to emergency calls and dispatching “What did the suspect look like?” can
elicit better information. Dispatchers could follow up by asking witnesses to focus on more specific characteristics – speech patterns, jewellery, tattoos – to give patrolling cops more to go on. This open-question technique forms part of a strategy called the cognitive interview, pioneered by Edward Geiselman also at UCLA. Other tricks include asking the witness to describe the scene first in chronological order, then backwards, which can trigger further recollections. Geiselman and colleagues described the technique in 1984. Field tests showed that it held up: detectives using cognitive interviews in Florida in 1989 and England in 1996 elicited 63 per cent and 55 per cent more information from witnesses, respectively. But this method has limitations – it may be difficult with an agitated emergency caller on the line, and some aspects are time consuming. Still, elements of the technique could help. Dispatchers could be trained to talk to callers in a way designed to calm them and prime them for more accurate recall. No one has yet studied whether the cognitive interview can specifically rein in racial profiling. Still, anything that provides better information can hopefully help lessen the effects of institutional racism. Better interviews won’t stop people dying, but if institutional racism arises one decision at a time, perhaps it is vulnerable to death by a thousand cuts. n 23 July 2016 | NewScientist | 19