Food For Thought | Nicholas Jackson and Stefen Vogler

Food for Thought: A series of public events featuring research and creative projects by recent CAS Associates and Fellows.
We are delighted to showcase the work of some of our most productive and creative faculty in this informal series of intellectually and spiritually invigorating presentations. You are invited to drop in when you can to learn about the exciting projects undertaken by our faculty.

11:00am-11:45am: Nicholas Jackson, CAS Fellow 2025-26, Chemistry
More information to come!

Noon-12:45pm: Stefen Vogler, CAS Fellow 2025-26, Sociology

Police Consciousness and the Potential for Reform
This talk develops the concept of “police consciousness” to explore how people understand policing either as a collective of autonomous individuals or as an institution with systemic influence. Drawing on a nationally representative survey of both LGBTQ and non-LGBTQ people and in-depth interviews with 59 LGBTQ survey respondents, Professor Vogler shows that this individual-institutional divide shapes attitudes toward police legitimacy and reform preferences. Those with institutional views are more likely to support more transformative and structural reforms, while those with more individualistic perspectives tend to favor reformist efforts focused on improving officers through things like training and weeding out “bad apples,” and these understandings and preferences are shaped by social identities.