Police Psychology | How Do We Find and Divert Violence Before It Happens?

Robert John Zagar PhD MPH and James Garbarino PhD

Homicide, suicide or mass murder, are two sides of a coin. Violence is either directed at others or at oneself. So how do we find violence?

Background checks miss violence 75% of the time. For interviews and judgment the figure is 54%, unstructured physical and psychiatric, 51%, and conventional ways combined miss 61% of violence. How can this be if background checks miss 75%, interviews miss only 54%, or exams 51%?

When the current approaches are summed into an average, the combined approach is less than any one single approach. One would be better off tossing a coin than using these conventional ways. Yet 95% of the professionals persist in “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Einstein defined this as insanity.

This fixation with ineffective approaches is costly.  In the United States, work productivity losses due to violence range from $1,000,000 – $5,000,000 per victim, whether it’s homicide, suicide or mass murder. (more…)