An experiment in police-community relations: A small group approach

To study the effectiveness of group discussion in mitigating the rising hostility between police and residents of the urban ghetto, two 15-member groups of police and ghetto residents held weekly discussions, led and observed by university researchers, for 12 weeks. Attitude scales administered at the beginning and end of the study, as well as recorded logs of the meetings, reveal increased understanding and empathy between initially hostile and defensive participants by the end of the study. With increased awareness of each others' problems came an increased faith in the power of cooperation to solve problems. Police became more interested in attempting to affect the causes of problems than in serving merely as disciplinarians, and some of the community members began to attempt to instill in their neighbors a more friendly attitude toward the police.