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Your Written Exam: How To Think Like A Cop
Sergeant George Gody
Preparation for judgment/situational test questions on the police written test may seem daunting, but in reality, you need to capture only one thing — the mindset of a police officer.
Thinking like a police officer is not simple, yet the elements that make up a police officers mindset are simple, straightforward and support effective, correct actions and decisions in situational dilemmas.
Preparing yourself to view situational questions with the mindset of a police officer involves establishing a solid analytical foundation based on three fundamentals:
1. Common Sense
2. Police Priorities
3. Police Hierarchies
When these fundamentals are combined and applied to police situational questions, they become a single, skilled viewpoint that ensures the most effective and equitable actions and decisions. Using these fundamentals as your primary information filters; you can approach any situational problem and determine an effective and appropriate course of action.
Common sense is knowledge acquired through trial and error, experience and commonly accepted animate and inanimate behaviors, and the laws of physics.
For example: Is it safer to talk to someone involved in an auto accident in the street or on the sidewalk? Common sense indicates: Sidewalk. If you were knocking on someone’s door, would you stand in front of the door or off to the side? Common sense indicates: Side. If you’re pursuing a traffic violator at a high rate of speed through downtown traffic, do you continue the pursuit or let him go? Common sense indicates: Let Him Go. The risk of injuring innocent people is too high versus upholding the law by stopping a traffic violator.
Another example: What would you do if you saw a naked man walking down the street with only a cell phone in his hand? Arrest him? If so, on what charge? You should first ask questions and determine what happened. He may be a victim of a crime, so don’t jump to conclusions.
In police work, and in police situational test questions, using common sense to evaluate the situation means basing actions and decisions on knowledge that is generally common to everyone, but is occurring in a situation that involves a need for police action.
Common sense should temper your reactions, allowing you to control the urge to jump to conclusions before gaining all the available facts. Often the set of circumstances seen at first glance seems to warrant a certain conclusion, however, common sense allows us to see where circumstances simply could not coexist in certain situational conflicts.
Police Priorities are defined by each law enforcement department in particular, but can also be identified in general for the purposes of preparing for police situational test questions.
Assessing a situation and the information pertaining to it requires relying on your common sense and using Police Priorities to determine the most effective, appropriate course of action.


officerforestal
2 days ago
6 Comments
Awesome information, very informative for newbies. I would suggest that anyone who is preparing for the police exam to get the top 50 most commonly asked police exam questions and answers here: http://www.passthepoliceexam.com
criminalhaysoos
6 days ago
6 Comments
Superb information. I'm very grateful.
foggm
13 days ago
60 Comments
Wow! Excellent article it was very informative.
JAdams
14 days ago
12 Comments
This article is very informative and direct.
tpm619
15 days ago
4 Comments
very good article......
Vigilant101
21 days ago
10942 Comments
WOW GREAT INFO. THANKS FROM THE SERIOUS ONES!!!*****
djecho78
about 1 month ago
2 Comments
Thank you, very informative.
ajkin3
about 1 month ago
2 Comments
who do i talk to about becoming a cop
JamieI
about 1 month ago
12 Comments
thank you.
guilmar
about 1 month ago
4 Comments
how do you check your score
elijahtblack
about 1 month ago
38 Comments
thanks i will keep this in mind when ever i run into one of my own out in the streets and out of town.
EricUlberg
about 1 month ago
104 Comments
As stated by many others, good info for us newbs.
localcowgirl
about 1 month ago
194 Comments
Thanks, I'll definitely keep this all in mind when I'm taking the tests. :)
Victoriann
about 1 month ago
56 Comments
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BigRed90771
2 months ago
6 Comments
Yeah that was helpful.