Page 8 - Top Cover Issue 4

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Firearms attack on Police at Woolwich – a wounded subject lying rapid reaction to a perceived visual threat.
on the floor continuing to raise the handgun back towards ARV T e dorsal stream provides the brain with rapid ‘danger’
Officers, having – yes, survivable injuries. information; this may often be a fast initial perception of
T e difference between the two incidents will revolve around movement. Movement captures visual attention, firing neurons
visual confirmation – the definite confirmation of a handgun – within the brain at a subconscious level. Specific threat cues may
but what if the subject’s hands can’t be seen, only a movement initiate the reflexive triggering of a ‘shoot’ response, especially
that appears compelling and a specific threat – what then? Do when the observed action ‘matches’ a contextually specific or
you wait? familiar cue. Pre-event information about the position of weapons
Legally, proportionality can appear to be a straightforward and subject intentions has a sensitising or framing effect; this
and simple process. Many people genuinely believe they see every assists the brain with anticipation and preparation for confronting
detail of what occurs in front of them – however this is never a subject.
the case, we process very limited visual information as humans. T e ability to initiate very fast anticipatory movements is
Officers seldom have sufficient time to analyse exactly what is an essential skill for ‘reading’ your opponent especially when
happening and then deliver a judicially measured response – one preparing and then commencing any physical interception. By
that fits within such a well-constructed legal expectation. So how way of a sporting illustration – subconscious and early visual
precise is a process of continual assessment? processing via the dorsal stream enables top tennis professionals
Human decision-making is frequently imperfect as a process to return serves of over 140mph.
and this is especially true when individuals must operate under With less than 0.3 seconds to visually observe and position
a significant time pressure. Fine judgements and accurate their own racket, tennis pros must scan and anticipate the arm
perception can be fluid processes requiring varying degrees of position of their opponent and the likely path of travel of the
time for optimal analysis and response selection. T e human tennis ball; this must all occur prior to the strike of the ball at
visual system cannot always process information accurately and service. To wait is to loose since the ventral stream lags behind
keeping pace with the speed of a subject’s hand movements, body – requiring additional information to determine what exactly is
rotation or weapon position can be extremely difficult – often happening. He who hesitates is lost!
impossible in very short passages of time where vision is directed
to a specific target.
Procedural actions become stored within long-term memory
after repeated practice and training. T reat cues receive privileged
access within the brain via the amygdala, our emotional early
warning system: a fast sub-conscious response mechanism to
initiate fight or flight. T e purpose of motor skills training for
firearms threats is to equip the individual with fast reactions for
the skilled delivery of a tactical option and as a consequence,
Officers become sensitised to specific threat cues that can be
subconsciously triggered with very limited visual information.
T e ‘gist’ of a movement is often enough to correctly anticipate
what a movement means.
Visually the brain has two specialist processing systems that
transport information obtained through our eyes. T ese two
visual pathways are often referred to as the ‘where’ and the ‘what’
streams – the ventral and dorsal streams. T e ventral or ‘what’
stream is slow, it requires context to bring some understanding
to the visual information being processed. However the dorsal
or ‘where’ stream is fast – very fast. It is the dorsal stream that
triggers a subconscious perception of movement and prompts the

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It is important to appreciate that two visual information
streams exist, because each ‘broadcast’ of visual information
requires a different time interval for the brain to make some
sense of what is happening – processed visual information may