Causes of Police Stress and Prevention Methods - Research Proposal Example

CAUSES OF POLICE STRESS AND PREVENTION METHODS Causes of police stress and prevention methods This is a proposal on a research that will determine the causes of stress among police officers and manners in which this kind of stress can be prevented. It starts with an introduction which asserts that the nature of police work make stress probable. The proposal then goes ahead and discusses the various studies that have been carried out on the causes of stress among police officers and the manner in which stress among police officers can be put under control. The literature review part introduces the kind of environment police officers work in and the nature of the profession as the major causes of stress for police officers. The proposal then goes ahead and discusses the methods that will be used in this research. It gives details on how data will be collected and the manner in which analysis will take place. The information from the studies and the conclusion from the studies are presented in the hypothesis. Introduction Stress plays an important part of the society. However, the manifestation of stress is usually dependent on a number of factors that are believed to be lifestyle related. For instance, students are likely to have exam stress. On the other hand, employees can have a performance expectation stress that might affect their performance. The police are in no way different from the rest of the society. As much as they are supposed to be the law enforcers, they are also human beings. Stress can be of either positive or negative effect of the performance of a police office. Stress might push a police officer to work harder than they were working before. However, in this case the focus will be on the negative stress that police might go through. In order t0o know the manner in which stress among the police can be reduced there is an importance to know the exact causes of stress am0ong polices officers. From knowing the causes, someone can be able to devise strategies that will reduce the rate of stress. This paper will be present a proposal for a research on the causes police officer stress and the ways through which police officers’ stress can be minimized. Methods Determining a population scope of this study would be a good way to start off this exercise. Since the data required should be specific to police officers and the effects of stress in their lives, they form the biggest percentage of this source. The other percentage would be of those who most frequently associate and interact with this group of people in their day to day endeavors. For this purpose, the family and close friends of policemen were subjected to this study apart from the policemen themselves. The police force is a wide body comprised of officers serving in different departments, ranks and levels of service. It would therefore be impractical to carry out the study on all individual police office in the force. Consequently, a two-way sampling exercise was selected for selection of the sample to be subjected to the actual study. However, for efficiency and accuracy purposes, it has to be ensured that the sample selected is a true representation of the population so that the findings and recommendations of the study may remain applicable to the whole population without exemption. The police officers in the force would first be sampled using a systematic method of sampling. Through this sampling method, officers would be randomly selected for representation with a common starting ground being selected such that the sampling process remains random even though there is a bias in the selection of starting point and direction of the study. After this group of officers has been selected, their family members and friends may be subjected to a simple random sampling process to determine the specific people who would be directly subjected to the study. This way, the level of discrepancy would be reduced to a minimum so that the findings of the study may be applied to the system as a whole without fear of application of biased findings. During the sampling process, it would be in order to ensure that each department of the police force is represented in the findings. As such, the sample size will be such that the sample representing each department is about ten percent of the total population in each specific department. This way, it will become possible to avoid over/under representation of the different departments in the different police stations. This would ensure that departments with a larger number of staff are equally represented in the sample. For this specific study, the specific findings and recommendations of the institutional Review board were considered. This is because the study was targeting the actual raw situation on the ground. The research involves human subjects that are questioned about their own or other people’s behavior and reactions to different stimuli causing stress as identified above. The study is a research as it falls under the definition of a research as provided by the Federal Policy for the Protection of Human subjects. As a result, there may be a need to seek documentation for the purposes of this study. Such documentation is to be provided by the Institutional Review Board upon their approval of the necessity of such a study. Such studies as these are known to carry with them a load of psychological impacts that are the biggest source of the discrepancies in the findings. Most subjects in these studies are known to give limited information with fear of victimization or negative publicity. As a result, this study has to assure participants of full anonymity in which case the firm should cover for damages that may result from publicity and victimization as a result of negligence and recklessness. Central to any ethical research practice in social research is anonymity and confidentiality of participants. This can be done by using varied dates to ensure they cannot be traced to any of the participants. The location of the research may also be anonymous even though this may be taken to be less practical and less desirable since it may impact heavily on the presentation of the findings of the research process. Participants in such research issues as these are faced by a number of risks that cannot be overlooked due to the possibility effects of these risks in the general outcome of the study. As such, it would be in order to study these risks and possible ways of dealing with them. Loss of time is one such risk. Depending on the complexity of the research process, participants may be disturbed by lengthy involvements in the research. To deal with this, it would be necessary to ensure that there is a limited loss of time of the participants during the study. Recalling traumatic events has been yet another risk that may occur during the research. Participants may undergo short-term suffering due to these memories, which may affect their work. As such, the researcher should provide the participants with a list of community resources that may be useful should there arise needs for counseling as a result of the research process. It should also be necessary to ensure that participants do not participate without their consent to certain stimuli that they would wish to avoid. Other minor and common risks that should be looked out for may include mental fatigue, boredom, frustration and embarrassment at poor performance. Such risks should be noted and mentioned on the consent statement so that they may be dealt with. In order to carry out a benefit-risk measure, it would be necessary to determine the benefits of this research process. At the beginning of the research, it was noted that care must be taken to ensure that the sample selected was a genuine representation of the whole population of interest. This would ensure that the benefits identified are applicable throughout the population. The benefits are to be measured in terms of the impacts of the study in the economic surplus and general efficiency after the recommendations are effected in the whole population of the police force. Only after the application of the recommendations would it become possible to carry out a benefit-risks ratio measure to determine the validity of the research. Prior to the study, assumed, expected effects of the findings may be used instead of the actual findings to determine whether it is necessary to carry out the study or not. This study would be generally a survey. Two instruments would be used for the collection of the needed information. These instruments would be the use of questionnaires and focus groups. The questionnaires would be administered to all the participants while the participants selected through the systematic sampling procedure would be subjected to focus groups to obtained refined information because in such groups, people have a tendency t freely share experiences without fear of publicity or victimization since everyone speaks out their minds. Literature Review McCraty, Atkinson, Lipsenthal & Arguelles (2009) are of the opinion that police officers are always exposed to people who are suffering from pain and distress. The nature of the profession of law enforcement dictates the police officers cannot be able to avoid interacting with crime offenders, suspects, and victims. Whether interesting with a victim or a suspect, one thing that both cases have in common is that both cases will involve individual suffering in one way or another. Spending allot of time with people who are in distress is likely to affect an individual’s emotions. The sad thing is that this is a scenario that law enforcement officers cannot be able to avoid. At the end of the day they are left in a situation where they try to relate and empathize with the situations that are faced by either a victim or a suspect. The stress might even be worse in a scenario where an officer wants to ease the pain, but just does not have the ability to do so. Kyle (2008) asserts that the concerns over one’s safety and health in law enforcement might be a cause of stress to police officers. Many police officers usually face situations that can lead to physical danger on a daily basis. This is specifically true for police officers who work in high crime rate areas and poor neighborhoods. With such police officers it can be said that they face constant risk or being injured or even killed on the line of duty. It is obvious that someone facing such risks will be stressed because they will be contemplating what will happen if in any case these risks materialize. Matters might even get worse when criminals whom they have arrested previously try to get back at them. This is a possibility that every police officer is aware of. What makes matters worse is the fact that such risks are not only faced by the police officers, but also their family members and their loved ones. Only a few people can be able to go through such a situation without being stressed. According to Kilpela (2011) police officers usually have the responsibility of making sure that the lives of citizens. This is something that is not easy. As much as the general public might have the impression that police officers should be strong and confident and take the front line in the defense of citizens. However, sometimes they might try all they can but still turn out to be unsuccessful. Such situation might lead to stress, especially if the police force is openly blamed for the sufferings that people in the society face as a result of criminal activities. Immediately a police officer starts blaming themselves for every crime that they are unable to prevent, and then stress will be inevitable. Self-blame is specifically common for police officers who are passionate about their careers and are always doing all they can to make sure that they are in a position to prevent crime. However, in real life, someone’s best effects does not always mean that they will be successful. Morash, Haarr & Kwak (2006) reveal the duty of a police officer usually involve rapid alternations. Despite the fact that the general public might have the impression that attending to crimes at crime scenes are all that police officers, they are usually very long because police officers also have to deskwork and protocols that have to be followed. One minute a police officer might be behind the desk working on report then suddenly they are informed of a crime situation where they have to attend to. It will be observed that they will have to leave the reports unfinished and thus making it hard for them to balance of paperwork and fieldwork. Every crime that a police officer attends to they are supposed to write reports. Inability to cope with the rapid change from fieldwork to paperwork might lead to stress. This is an implication that some police officers might find themselves in a situation where they are lagging behind in terms of the paperwork that they are supposed to attend to. Thinking about the paperwork that they are supposed to be working on and the fact that they have to attend to crimes as soon as they are informed about them is a situation that can lead to stress for any police officers. Finney, Stergiopoulos, Hensel, Bonato & Dewa (2013) are of the opinion that being in possession of firearms does not always lead to a feeling of security as most people might assume. The guns that police officers walk around might of psychological effect to them. The weight becomes even harder when it comes to a police officer who has to carry their guns home, yet they have children at home. It should also be noted that having possession of firearms at home can be very dangerous, especially with children who are at ages where they are likely to get curious or even feel scared whenever the firearms are at home. Other police officers also tend to become over dependent on firearms to an extent that they feel insecure whenever they do not have firearms. As a result of such situations it will be observed that either way the possession of firearms might lead to stress. Hypotheses Given the fact that human beings are emotional beings, stress is hardly evitable for anyone who works as a police officer. Various studies that have been carried out on police stress, their causes, and preventions reveals that the environment that a police officer works in is likely to determine the level of their vulnerability to stress. The other causes of stress basically come from the nature of the work that police officers are expected to do and the fact that there are expectations from the public and from themselves. The fact that they have to work on crimes and also works on reports can be stressing during certain periods. However, prevention is possible through making sure that they are psychologically prepared and that work plan is such that everything that they do is done with the best timing so that the possibilities of failure can be reduced. This is an indication that police stress can be prevented or reduced. References Finney, C., Stergiopoulos, E., Hensel, J., Bonato, S., &Dewa, C. S. (2013). Organizational stressors associated with job stress and burnout in correctional officers: a systematic review. BMC Public Health, 13(1), 82. Kilpela, D. R. (2011).Causes and cures for stress amongst police officers with an emphasis on female police officers. Kyle, B. F. (2008). Stress and anxiety reduction factors among law enforcement officers. McCraty, R., Atkinson, M., Lipsenthal, L., & Arguelles, L. (2009). New hope for correctional officers: an innovative program for reducing stress and health risks. Applied psychophysiology and biofeedback, 34(4), 251-272. Morash, M., Haarr, R., &Kwak, D. H. (2006). Multilevel influences on police stress. Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 22(1), 26-43. Read More