Voorkomt low ready shoot/no shoot beslissing?

Heeft de positie van het vuurwapen effect op de uitkomst van een potentiele geweldsituatie? Komen we zo op maar eerst dit. Deze studie is een voorbeeld van “veerkracht engineering”:

“Rather than trying to reduce or remove the frailties and failures inherent in the human element within all systems, resilience engineers assume human failures will inevitably occur as a normal part of any human activity (e.g., Perrow, 2011) and they seek ways to develop processes and systems to reduce or eliminate the negative consequences of those failures”.

Nu de uitkomst van de studie

In het kort: The results demonstrate that officers can significantly improve shoot/no-shoot decision-making without sacrificing a significant amount of time by taking a lower muzzle-position when they are dealing with an ambiguously armed person – a person whose hands are not visible.

Quote: “After the experiment was complete, it was proven that when officers had firearms at a low ready position, they cut their chance of making misdiagnosis shooting errors by more than half and it only cost them 11/100th of a second”.

Mogelijke verklaringen
“There are a number of reasons why the low-ready position may produce fewer shooting errors than the aimed or high-ready positions:
–         “it could be that .11 seconds is simply enough additional time for more officers to check their swing.
–         “It could also be that lowering the firearm out of the officers’ field of view increases the time – beyond even the .11 seconds – officers have to visually identify the object coming out of the person’s pocket.
–         “ lowering the firearm may also improve an officer’s ability to communicate with a person in crises and, perhaps in some instances, increase the chances of diffusing a situation before split-second decision-making is even required”.

Let op!

Onderzoek test hypotheses in aangepaste situaties die niet direct generaliseerbaar zijn naar de echte wereld. Lees daarom alle nuances. De uitkomst van deze en andere studies kunnen wel ideen genereren om verder te onderzoek of uit te testen in onderwijs en training.

PS: ik sta altijd open voor feedback en andere inzichten! De interpretatie van deze studie is van mijzelf en niet van de onderzoekers.

Taylor, P. L. (2021). “Engineering Resilience” Into Split-Second Shoot/No Shoot Decisions: The Effect of Muzzle-Position. Police Quarterly24(2), 185–204.