NCJ Number
89709
Journal
Journal of Police Science and Administration Volume: 11 Issue: 1 Dated: (March 1983) Pages: 23-30
Date Published
1983
Length
8 pages
Annotation
Study findings show that police officers have a moderate degree of self-estrangement compared with other occupational groups, and individual and job factors interact to produce varying degrees of self-estrangement.
Abstract
This study was part of a larger project in which the work attitudes of 1,313 employees representing seven occupational groups were examined. The participating police agencies were located in a large midwestern metropolitan area, with the total sample consisting of 607 police officers, including State (n=140), suburban (n=130), and city (n=337) officers. The questionnaire used contained a section on demographic characteristics, measures of job characteristics, a measure of work expectations, a measure of self-estrangement, and a rating of work dimensions in terms of importance. Self-estrangement is defined as a lack of intrinsic fulfillment in work, and job characteristics consist of task and task-related characteristics. The task characteristics considered were powerlessness and meaninglessness in work. In addition to finding that police officers have a moderate degree of self-estrangement compared to other occupational groups, this condition was found to increase from State to suburban to city officers. In finding that individual and job factors interact to produce varying degrees of self-estrangement, job factors accounted for a substantially larger proportion of the variance. Moreover, it appears that as job characteristics become more distant to task performance, the less their impact. The results suggest that the task conditions of meaninglessness and powerlessness are the most powerful determinants of self-estrangement in all departments. Work expectation was found to be a fairly strong predictor of self-estrangement in each departmental group. Tabular data and 25 references are provided.