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In today’s exercise, you will be practicing how to conduct a hasty search in an outdoor mall while establishing a baseline and looking for anomalies.
The Workout
- As you watch the video, immediately conduct a hasty search of the area to establish an initial baseline and evaluate each person as being part of the baseline or an anomaly worth investigating.
- Be able to articulate why your baseline was what you determined it to be and why anyone identified stood out from the baseline.
- If you identify anyone, determine what you would do about the situation.
- Write your answers on a sheet of paper before viewing our answers
View Our Answers
- The baseline:
- The area has positive atmospherics.
- The area is clean (the delivery guy is concerned about having a mess in the walkway), the noise level is conversation (not confrontational and there is music playing), and orderly as people are walking at a relaxed pace and staying to the right side of the walkways.
- I confirm that the baseline is positive atmospherics by assessing that most people are displaying the comfortable cluster of behavior.
- The anomalies:
- Because the baseline is positive atmospherics, I am searching for high intensity dominance and high intensity discomfort as anomalies.
- The only display of anomalous behavior that I identify is the man that is observed on the left side of the frame at around the 0:30 point displaying dominance.
- It is the man at the water fountain wearing a yellow tee-shirt, with a red long-sleeved shirt underneath, wearing the yellow or tan baseball hat.
- His display of dominance is assessed as his left foot drops back into a fighting stance, as his elbows spread out and as his hands move into a knife hand/karate chop motion.
- The decision
- As this display of dominance is only directed at the water coming out of the drinking fountain, I assessed the person as not being a threat, despite the display of dominance.
- The display of dominance, despite being outside of the baseline, was a false positive and no action was required.
- Follow Up:
- Add a comment with the assessments that you made, but that we didn’t make, so that we can check for those assessments and provide feedback on those specific observations. We will add them to our answers in the post itself for future viewings of the exercise.
Enhance The Workout
- Repeat
- Note the assessments that we made that you didn’t make, and re-watch the video to build your file folder for that specific behavior.
- The goals for this exercise were to allow you to practice the steps that go into the hasty search and to make the search for anomalies within the baseline established through a hasty search more intuitive through repetition.
- Repeat as often as needed to become comfortable with each step of the hasty search.
- Reflect
- What was easy for you and what was difficult in this exercise? What did you do correctly and where do you need to improve?
- Write these down to see progress made over time spent practicing behavioral analysis.
- Act
- This video was taken on the Pearl Street Mall (an outdoor mall) in Boulder, CO, during the middle of the afternoon on a weekday in the spring.
- Identify an area where you can practice this exercise in real time to solidify today’s exercise with personal experience both in your professional life and personal life.
Related Content:
- Visual Guide: Conducting A Hasty Search: A Flow Chart
2 Comments
Ron Garner
I liked the video and the exercise.
In my line of work when I walk a crowd that is comfortable, I like to engaged a couple more items and tend to include in my search mission focused people, such as the guy seen within the first 10 seconds that was moving quickly in a straight line that appeared almost mission focused. He peeked my interest until it seemed he was an employee or vendor with a clip board (Although not confirmed that he was an employee). Often I like to include proxemic push to or pulled and lines of drift with a hasty search to help me assess those coming at me. I like to look at the feet (if possible) for direction and do a quick look at the position and contents in their hands (as much as possible). I had a couple low level concerns as I "walked" through it that in real life may have resulted in my moving slightly to the right or left and perhaps pausing (slowing my pace) to be courteous to others (and gain a better reactionary gap). I love the hasty search because with the rise in random attracts/threats it is perhaps the best defensive measure... for example, the "knock out game" as "played by some young adults" tries to strike a single blow as they pass by someone to see if they can knock them out. I am told it is usually in situations where it is calm and "a nice day" where this behavior was never expected.
Gonzalo Senosiain
In second 10 I see a couple on the left side, the guy is showing dominance, I cannot see his hand holding her arm but I assume it could have happened, I sense him managing her in a protective way, he seems aware of the surroundings, he has his shoulders wide open, like gaining space.