NCJ Number
183230
Journal
Criminal Justice and Behavior Volume: 27 Issue: 3 Dated: June 2000 Pages: 375-400
Date Published
June 2000
Length
26 pages
Annotation
This article describes a conceptual model for coping with stressful events in police work.
Abstract
Acute stress is inherent in police work. The inability to cope effectively with stressful events can result in undesirable psychological and somatic outcomes, leading to chronic stress, burnout, and quitting the profession. This article proposes to: (1) review the coping process in police stress; (2) identify adaptive and maladaptive coping styles in police work; and (3) suggest coping strategies that reflect the coping model to reduce both chronic and acute forms of stress and to improve job satisfaction and performance among police officers. The model consists of officers’ detection of stressful events or stimuli, their cognitive appraisal of the events or stimuli and their application of approach- or avoidance-coping dimensions and cognitive- and behavioral-coping subdimensions. With respect to this model, in-service training is needed on when to deemphasize certain situations as stressful, to prioritize some but not all events as requiring optimal attention and response readiness and to learn the situations that warrant different types of cognitive appraisals, including nonstressful appraisals. Figure, references