In 2002, Correll and others published a paper titled, “The Police Officer’s Dilemma.” The paper was, in part, a reaction to the death of Amadou Diallo, an unarmed black man who was shot and killed by New York police, who thought he had a weapon. In the media and in the public at large, this tragic incident raised questions about whether race influences police use of force, particularly whether police are more likely to shoot a black suspect than a white suspect. These questions have long been of interest to criminologists and sociologists.

Bias Studies at the University of Chicago

Since 2000, investigators in the Stereotyping and Prejudice Research Laboratory in the Psychology Department at the University of Chicago have been working to develop and refine a first-person-shooter video game, which presents a series of images of young men—some armed, some unarmed—set against realistic backgrounds such as parks or city streets. The player’s goal is to shoot any and all armed targets but not to shoot unarmed targets. Half of the targets are black, and half are white. The laboratory is using this game to investigate whether decisions to shoot at a potentially hostile target can be influenced by the target’s race.