Marching in unison may increase risk of
use of excessive force in policing protests
In
the aftermath of the Aug. 9 shooting of an 18-year-old African American man by
a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, much of the nation's attention
has been focused on how law enforcement's use of military gear might have
inflamed tensions.
But
what if the simple act of marching in unison -- as riot police routinely do --
increases the likelihood that law enforcement will use excessive force in
policing protests?
That's
the suggestion of a new study by a pair of UCLA social scientists.
"That calculation appears to make men who march with other
men feel less vulnerable and more powerful and their potential foe more easily
vanquished. We theorize that it also makes them more likely to use violence
than they otherwise would be."
Study
co-author Colin Holbrook said media coverage of Ferguson frequently showed
police slowly advancing in lockstep on protesters who were standing with their
hands up. "Not only can it be quite intimidating to see a group marching
in unison, but we've also found -- and past research supports -- that the mere
act of moving in sync also makes those in formation feel more formidable and
therefore potentially more likely to be aggressive."
Fessler's
and Holbrook's findings are published online today by Biology Letters.
For
the strikingly simple experiment, Fessler and Holbrook recruited 96
undergraduate men, pairing each with an experimenter who posed as a fellow
recruit. Half the participants were instructed to walk in unison with their
partners. The other half were asked just to accompany their partners, but
without walking in lockstep. Participants were not allowed to talk to each
other, and all followed the same 800-foot route, outside of UCLA's Pauley
Pavilion.
Afterward,
each participant was given a range of tests, most of them to disguise the real
purpose of the study. Ultimately, each study subject was shown a photograph
showing a man's face with an angry expression.
Based on that information alone,
subjects were asked to estimate the man's height in feet and inches and then
asked to guess his size by choosing images from two different charts, each
showing six silhouettes. On one chart, each image was progressively taller and
bigger; on the other, each appeared progressively more muscular.
Even
though each participant was accompanied only by a single companion, those who
walked in unison with their partners judged the angry man as significantly less
physically imposing than did the study subjects who had not walked in unison
with their confederate: On average, they estimated that the man in the photo
was about an inch shorter than the other participants did. Although the
researchers noted the difference was relatively small, they said the strength
of the finding was so strong that the chance of it being a fluke was 1 in 100.
The
researchers said the effect would likely have been even stronger had the study
more closely approximated the conditions of police and military training.
"If
we had more people marching together, and if they had marched together
repeatedly like police and the military do in drills, we would have expected a
stronger effect," said Holbrook, a postdoctoral fellow at UCLA's Center
for Behavior, Evolution and Culture.
The
researchers theorize that humans have evolved to view the act of moving in
unison as a marker of a group's strength. Further, the perception pertains to
both observers, especially potential adversaries, and to those moving together
in formation.
"The
ability to move in unison indicates that one is part of an effective fighting
alliance," said Fessler, who also is director of the Center for Behavior,
Evolution and Culture. "That's no accident. In order for individuals to be
synchronized, they have to be motivated to coordinate their behavior -- they
have to be paying attention to what one another are doing, and they have to be
skilled and competent. A deep part of our brain registers this
connection."
The
connection may help explain the continued use of military parades and drills at
a time when armed forces increasingly rely on air strikes, the researchers
contend. Marching band performances at sporting events and fans spontaneously
breaking into the "wave" at stadiums also communicate -- albeit
unconsciously -- that the participants are part of a powerful and intimidating
coalition.
Research
has found that marching in unison might actually make people more likely to be
aggressive. In a 2012 study conducted by a University of Southern California
professor, subjects who had walked in sync with another person were more likely
to take actions that they thought would result in the death of sow bugs than
those who walked together in no particular pattern.
In
many species, natural selection appears to favor animals most skilled at moving
in unison. In research published this year, for example, researchers at Florida
Atlantic University found that dolphins traveling in tightly coordinated groups
are more likely to win fights with other dolphins than those in groups that
swim and breach in unison less often.
Fessler's
and Holbrook's latest findings build on more than 30 studies they have
conducted into unconscious assumptions people make when they assess the risk
posed by another in a potentially dangerous situation.
With funding from the
Air Force Office of Scientific Research, the researchers have found that people
appear to compute the risk posed by a potential adversary by arriving at a
quick mental picture of the size of the potential assailant, regardless of
whether the foe's size is germane to the risk.
For
instance, Fessler and Holbrook have found that a foe's envisioned size and
muscularity is influenced by his access to weapons, propensity to take risks
and -- in a study conducted immediately following the death of Osama Bin Laden
-- the success or failure of his leader. They've also found that when men are
in groups they tend to reduce the envisioned size and strength of a potential
foe.
"Experiencing
moving in unison with another person appears to make us paint a less
threatening picture of a potential assailant," Fessler said. "They
loom less large and formidable in the mind's eye. Simply walking in sync may
make men more likely to think, 'Yeah, we could take that guy!'"
Story Source:
The
above story is based on materials provided by University of
California - Los Angeles. The original article was written by Meg Sullivan. Note:
Materials may be edited for content and length.
Journal Reference:
1.
D. M. T. Fessler, C.
Holbrook. Marching into battle: synchronized walking diminishes the
conceptualized formidability of an antagonist in men. Biology
Letters, 2014; 10 (8): 20140592 DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2014.0592
Cite This Page:
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APA
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Chicago
University of California - Los Angeles. "Marching in unison
may increase risk of use of excessive force in policing protests." Science
Daily, 27 August 2014.
<www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/08/140827101435.htm>.
