Female police officers make the same snap decisions as males-but trust themselves less

Introduction

Although women have been able to join most of the European police forces for decades, in 2020 their presence represented only 20% of their members, with strong contrasts between nations (Eurostat, 2019). This fact has led various governments to introduce positive action measures (Molina, 2022). This is consistent with societal aspirations for equality, but also with evidence that a greater presence of women in the police improves the effectiveness of police forces and their relationships with the citizens they serve (Silvestri, 2015). On the other hand, it may lead to situations where male police officers perceive that females are unfairly promoted based on gender rather than skills and experience (Drew and Sanders, 2020).

Still, studies on general decision-making reveal differences based on gender. For example, it has been reported that women tend to use all the information available in the environment, weighing benefits and consequences, while men select the information that supports their goal-oriented decisions (Byrne and Worthy, 2016). Women have also been found to be more willing to seek support in decision-making situations (Tamres et al., 2002), to prefer interpersonally oriented decision-making styles (Delaney et al., 2015), to make less risky decisions (Villanueva-Moya and Exposito, 2021), and to require more time and effort to make decisions (Evans and Hampson, 2015).

Assuming that gender differences in decision-making in other domains apply to the police may be a simplistic conceptualization (Rabe-Hemp, 2008), and few studies have analysed gender differences in policing. For example, it has been reported that female police officers tend to use less force than males (Lonsway, 2003), including less use of their firearm (Stepler, 2017), and that they are more likely to base their decisions on caring strategies, such as empathy (Schuck, 2014). However, actual behaviour and people’s perceptions should be differentiated. For instance, research suggests that the general population overestimates the gender difference in risk tolerance (Roszkowski and Grable, 2005), and that male police officers have concerns about the capabilities of female officers, especially in relation to skills and physical strength (Chu and Tsao, 2014).

It is often argued that the underestimation of female police officers’ abilities, especially by their male counterparts, is part of the hypermasculine culture prevalent in most police forces (Alexander, 2019). A culture that pressurises officers to conform to a macho stereotype (Workman-Stark, 2017) and value physical elements over the social service aspects of policing (Cochran and Bromley, 2003). One of the many negative consequences of these extended views is that discrimination and sexual harassment are frequently reported by female police officers (Angehrn et al., 2021), whose experience can be often described in terms of “banter, bullying and harassment” (Cunningham and Ramshaw, 2020: 26). Not surprisingly, evidence suggests that many female officers feel they need to constantly modify their behaviour to prove their capabilities (Haarr and Morash, 2013).

This paper extends recent research in this domain by focussing on irrevocable critical situations where police officers must make snap high-stake decisions under conditions of uncertainty. Prior research has shown that the police manage such situations by seeking out additional information and updating their assessments based on their previous experience; if uncertainty persists, it is reduced by relying on standard operating procedures or by purposefully deferring the execution of their plan (van Den Heuvel et al., 2014). However, research on gender differences in these situations is surprisingly limited. To the best of our knowledge, Shortland et al.’s (2020) is the only previous study addressing this issue. From a sample of 96 British senior police officers, they found that female officers were slower to assess the situation, though male officers showed higher tendency to make avoidant decisions. However, it should be noted that only 26% of their sample was female, and they had substantially less military experience than their male counterparts – which the study found had an impact on decision-making.

As other authors, Shortland et al. (2020) approached the analysis of these scenarios through the use of vignettes, a form of naturalistic research with proven efficacy in the analysis of decision-making in critical settings. Our research follows the same general methodology, though with two important novelties. First, we use a framework of vignettes that, unlike previous works, allows the identification of the ‘right’ answer regarding the trade-off of expeditious action versus accurate action–the appropriateness of acting immediately or waiting for more information depends on the specific scenario. Furthermore, in our study waiting constitutes a conscious decision rather than indecision because participants must select the option to wait (rather than just take a longer time to act as in prior research). Based on the literature, we hypothesised that decisions would be taken later and considered more difficult, and less self-confidence would be perceived in women, compared to men.

Materials and methods

Results

Action time

Data were available from 225 participants for vignette 1, 247 participants for vignette 2, and 240 participants for vignette 3. Overall, in 44.8% of the trials the participants decided to act at the first decision point, in 21.9% they acted at the second decision point, in 22.6% they acted at the third decision point and in 10.7% they had not decided to act when the third screen (decision point) closed. Table 1 shows the results for the complete set of vignettes and for each vignette.

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Table 1.

Action time distribution (n, (%)).

Vignette	Gender	Action time
		1	2	3	+3	Total
1	Female	51 (46.4)	18 (16.4)	26 (23.6)	15 (13.6)	110
	Male	37 (32.2)	19 (16.5)	36 (31.3)	23 (20)	115
	Total	88 (39.1)	37 (16.4)	62 (27.6)	38 (16.9)	225
2	Female	89 (71.2)	19 (15.2)	7 (5.6)	10 (8)	125
	Male	82 (67.2)	19 (15.6)	7 (5.7)	14 (11.4)	122
	Total	171 (69.2)	38 (15.4)	14 (5.7)	24 (9.7)	247
3	Female	34 (27)	45 (35.7)	40 (31.7)	7 (5.6)	126
	Male	26 (22.8)	36 (31.6)	45 (39.5)	7 (6.1)	114
	Total	60 (25)	81 (33.8)	85 (35.4)	14 (5.8)	240
Total	Female	174 (48.2)	82 (22.7)	73 (20.2)	32 (8.9)	361
	Male	145 (41.3)	74 (21.1)	88 (25.1)	44 (12.5)	351
	Total	319 (44.8)	156 (21.9)	161 (22.6)	76 (10.7)	712

No statistically significant difference was found between females and males, neither for the total set (χ²₍₃₎ = 6.200, p = .102, Cramer’s V = 0.09) nor for any of the vignettes (χ²₍₃₎ = 5.443, p = .142, Cramer’s V = 0.16 for vignette 1; χ²₍₃₎ = 0.917, p = .821, Cramer’s V = 0.06 for vignette 2; χ²₍₃₎ = 1.765, p = .623, Cramer’s V = 0.09 for vignette 3). According to the experts, participants made the right decision only in 24% of the trials (n = 171); percentages were 27.6% for vignette 1, 9.7% for vignette 2, and 35.4% for vignette 3. Vignette 2 obtained significantly less correct decisions than vignettes 1 (U = 22830.5, p < .001, r = 0.23) and 3 (U = 22022.5, p < .001, r = 0.31), with no significant difference between 1 and 3 (U = 24877.5, p = .069, r = 0.08). There were no differences between females and males for the total set (χ²₍₁₎ = 3.526, p = .060, Cramer’s V = 0.07; females 21.1%, males 27.1%) nor for any of the vignettes (χ²₍₁₎ = 1.656, p = .198, Cramer’s V = 0.09, females 23.6%, males 31.3%, for vignette 1; χ²₍₁₎ = 0.850, p = .357, Cramer’s V = 0.06, females 8%, males 11.5%, for vignette 2; χ²₍₁₎ = 1.536, p = .211, Cramer’s V = 0.08, females 31.7%, males 39.5%, for vignette 3).

Discussion

Our study sought to evaluate gender differences in policing scenarios demanding snap decisions under time pressure and uncertainty. Based on the literature, we assumed that females would perform worse in speed of action, perceived difficulty, and confidence in their decisions, as compared to males. This hypothesis was tested through the completion of the DISPUTE vignettes by a fairly large sample of students from the Guardia Civil school.

Contrary to our hypothesis, women did not differ from men in action time or perceived difficulty, which can be considered contrary to the numerous studies that suggest riskier behaviour in men (e.g., Stepler, 2017). It should be noted that, contrary to other works (e.g., Shortland et al., 2020), in our study faster action is not associated with better or worse results. According to the judgment of the experts, the individuals should wait until an appropriate threshold of available information – and not beyond it. This was accomplished in only about one fourth of the trials, which may evidence inappropriate training, lack of experience, or simply the inherent difficulty of the scenarios depicted. In any case, a key point for this paper is that female participants performed as well (or rather, as badly) as their male colleagues. In fact, it could be argued that by more accurately recognising the likelihood of their poor performance, they showed a higher level of self-awareness than their male colleagues.

However, and as suggested in our hypothesis, we found a strong effect of gender on decision-making confidence, with females showing significantly less confidence than males. This result may be at least partly explained by stereotype threat, defined as the situation “when a person is aware of a negative stereotype about their social group and is concerned about confirming it” (Villanueva-Moya and Expósito, 2021: 706). The concept has been popular in psychology since the seminal study by Steele and Aronson (1995) and, whilst they focused on ethnic stereotypes, it has also been analysed in relation to a variety of domains, from the use of healthcare services by LGTB people (Fingerhut and Abdou, 2017) to teachers’ perceptions of migrants’ academic performance (Froehlich et al., 2018) or the challenges of military veterans in their transition to the workplace (Shepherd et al., 2020), amongst others.

In experimental conditions, stereotype threat has been linked to more disadvantageous risk decisions by women (e.g., Schmader et al., 2008). In this regard, the police culture is widely described as masculine and conservative, and little welcoming to those who do not fit male norms (Westmarland, 2017; Workman-Stark, 2015). Faced with this, female police officers tend to constantly perceive themselves on trial (Archbold and Schulz, 2008). The fact that gender differences in confidence were especially prominent for vignette 2 is illustrative, since it is the only scenario with a particularly high demand for physical abilities (rescuing people from the sea). In line with the stereotype threat, this may challenge female officers’ perceptions of their own physical limitations in such a task.

The literature abundantly illustrates the negative correlates of stereotype threat, including worse performance in difficult tasks (Drace et al., 2020), lower aspirations (Davies et al., 2005), higher work exhaustion and exit intentions (Van Veelen and Derks, 2021), and reduced social cohesion of the groups they work in (Grover et al., 2017). Our findings add to this evidence and suggest the need to implement stereotype interventions in the police. In this regard, ingroup role model interventions (e.g., Kortland and Kinias, 2019), self-affirmation interventions (e.g., Martens et al., 2006), teaching about stereotype (Johns et al., 2005), or mindfulness (e.g., Jarunratanakul and Jinchang, 2018), are some of the approaches whose success has been reported.

Our paper presents the strength of comparing relatively large samples of young police officers with a similar level of professional preparation and no practical work experience. This allows us to control for possible confounding variables like exposure to different organizational cultures or professional trajectories of varying durations, among others. Additionally, the use of scenarios based on real and everyday police events increases the validity of our conclusions. On the other hand, although our results illustrate the outcome of decision-making, they do not reveal the processes that lead each participant to that outcome–therefore they make it impossible to check whether, as Byrne and Worthy (2016) argue, women and men differ in the amount and type of information they use when making decisions. Future work with qualitative methodology (post-decision-making interviews) may shed more light on this point. Similarly, the limited number of scenarios used does not allow for a deeper exploration of the possible influence that the level of physical activity required in each one exerts on the decision-making process. Future experimental work manipulating this aspect – and relating it to participants’ physical self-concept – may contribute to our understanding of the topic.