Despite common misconception, law enforcement is highly hazardous and stressful position. In modern day, officers may confront arrogant, mentally disturbed, and potentially armed individuals. Furthermore, due to police’s negative reputation, officers are also facing more instances of harassment and insubordination among other conventional issues. In addition, police departments across the country are faced with extreme understaffing, leaving officers working long hours, overtime, and covering dangerous calls without backup. All of this begins to add up over time, and along with critical situations, may cause trauma and mental breakdowns. Not only is this dangerous from a health and wellness perspective, it impacts the ability of officers to perform professional duties competently and can lead to high turnover rates and a disparaging culture within the workforce. An increasing number of police personnel are facing depression, PTSD, substance abuse, and even suicide, as more officers are likely to die to suicide than in the line of duty in recent years and 1 in 4 has contemplated it.
Controlling stress before it becomes an overwhelming problem is vital. Peak et al. (2018) discuss the potential for holistic wellness programs aimed at reducing stress. These police funded programs will provide time off for officers, offer education for officers on stress-coping strategies, and provide counseling services either in-house or with subsidies to outside mental health services. Some general seminars on managing stress should be mandatory, but utilization of other services should remain optional although strongly encouraged. Overall, through education and awareness, the culture around mental health should be made a norm and acceptable among police officers. Although officers have historically maintained a very ‘macho’ and strict culture of perseverance, in modern day, it is likely that officers, especially those with experience, realize the tremendous toll that the job is taking on them. Therefore, offering them ways to address the problem is one way of approaching it, with a holistic wellness approach.
Whether part of a program or independently, a presence of a psychologist in police departments is potentially a strong necessity. This can be helpful not to just help deal with trauma, but evidence shows that counseling can lead to reduced aggressive and biased policing. The critical social issues where officers aggressively reacted to persons of color stem not just from inadequate law enforcement and bias training, but also the ability of officers to deal with emotions and maintain collectiveness during incidents. More police departments are teaming with mental health professionals, and early data is indicating that by working through the police officers, the mental health counselors are making a difference, as communities are healthier, safer, and financially and socially stable (Abramson, 2021).
Policing, by its nature, is a profession that has a higher than usual occupational stress. Most officers realize this when going into the job and undergoing training. However, a range of risk factors are systemic that should be addressed at the leadership, organizational, and community levels (Syed et al., 2020). Police receive poor social support, a concern that is often overlooked but can be improved by funding more community outreach and public relations campaigns. Occupational stress can be reduced through a variety of other policies such as limiting overtime, providing partners or mentors, and offering benefits to address difficulties that officers may face. Effective interventions are needed at the systemic and organizational levels, but police departments typically remain as very slow-changing entities that are highly unionized and cautious of any innovative or drastic shifts in the status quo.
References
Abramson, A. (2021). Building mental health into emergency responses. Monitor on Psychology, 52(5), 30. Web.
Peak, K., Gaines, L. K., & Glensor, R. W. (2018). Managing and leading today’s police (4th Edition). Pearson Education (US). Web.
Syed, S., Ashwick, R., Schlosser, M., Jones, R., Rowe, S., & Billings, J. (2020). Global prevalence and risk factors for mental health problems in police personnel: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Occupational and Environmental Medicine, 77(11), 737–747. Web.