Police stops unintentionally increase criminal behavior in black and Latino youths

April 09, 2019

New York, NY - New research by NYU Steinhardt doctoral candidate Juan Del Toro finds that Black and Latino adolescent boys who are stopped by police report more frequent engagement in delinquent behavior thereafter. The study also demonstrates that police stops have a negative impact on the adolescents' psychological well-being.

"Our findings indicate that the single most common proactive policing strategy - directing officers to make contact with individual boys and young men in 'high crime' areas - may impose a terrible cost on Black and Latino youth across the country," said Juan Del Toro, doctoral candidate in NYU Steinhardt's Department of Applied Psychology. "Police stops are associated with harmful outcomes including subsequent delinquent behavior and psychological distress that may be even more harmful when they occur earlier in boys' lives. These consequences warrant urgent attention from social scientists and policymakers."

This research was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS). The full research article can be viewed at https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2019/04/02/1808976116.

The Problem with Proactive Policing

Police agencies across the country have sought out to reduce crimes by shifting to what is known as "proactive policing" - proactively deploying officers to places where crime is likely to be reported and to engage with people most likely to be accused of those crimes.

More:
https://www.brightsurf.com/news/article/040919480487/police-stops-unintentionally-increase-criminal-behavior-in-black-and-latino-youths.html