Previous scholarship suggests higher rates of suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, and suicide completions for law enforcement, compared to the general population, which are hypothesized to correlate to their levels of occupational and organization stress and depression. Violanti and Steege’s 2021 research, using proportionate mortality ratio data from 1999, 2003-2004, and 2007-2014, showed that law enforcement officers are generally 54% more likely to die by suicide than the general population.
By the very nature of their job, law enforcement officers experience an inordinate amount of stress. Occupational stressors are external events consistent with the general body of law enforcement, such as long periods of inactivity interrupted by sudden emergency responses to traumatic calls, scenes of death, and the fear of being assaulted. Organizational stressors, on the other hand, are internal and vary from organization to organization, but generally include unclear orders, lack of support from administrators, and low morale. Both occupational and organizational stressors have been found to increase police stress (Chae & Boyle, 2013) and depressive symptoms (Allison et al., 2019).
Occupational Stress
Stress is pervasive in law enforcement from the spontaneity and severity of physical demands and sudden life-threatening situations (Russell, 2014). When an officer experiences these events, the stress response manifests in the brain’s hypothalamus, which is also responsible for controlling eating, drinking, hormones, and various organs. As a result, stress can cause physical, mental, and emotional changes (Denhardt, 2016). Physical symptoms can include shortness of breath, auditory exclusion, and tunnel vision. Chronic stress means that mental and emotional changes can co-occur and often include anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation (Papazoglou, 2017). These symptoms can lead to aggressivity which causes officers to perceive both professional and personal situations as more dangerous than they really are (Queiros, 2013). In extreme cases, stress can lead to workplace violence and/or completed suicide (Denhardt, 2016). It’s clear that stress can deeply impact an individual, and it can also impact an organization.
Over time, this chronic stress can develop into fatigue, which occurs in some officers at most agencies (Vila & Kenney, 2002). The literature is unanimous that police officers in the United States suffer from very high levels of fatigue, which can worsen an officer’s mood and exacerbate their anxiety, depression, impulsiveness, and suicidal ideations. As the fatigue persists, officers experience a deficit in their performance, health, and safety, which generates even more stress in a vicious cycle (Vila, et al., 2002).
As this cycle continues, officers experience burnout which is characterized by exhaustion and increasing cynicism (Violanti et al., 2018). Burnout can also lead to emotional detachment and a distrust of administrators (Gau et al., 2013).
Organizational Stress
Research indicates that the majority of law enforcement officers who experienced a life-threatening situation (occupational stress) felt abandoned by their department administrators during their recovery (Plaxton-Hennings, 2004). These feelings of administrators being unsupportive and unresponsive only served to exacerbate the officers’ pre-existing organizational stress and synergize their occupational stress. In extreme life-threatening situations that resulted in an officer being hospitalized, these feelings were so significant that the officers frequently experienced depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, and suicidal ideation (Carlier et al., 1997).
These organizational stressors, more so than occupational stressors, have continued to prove more significant in predicting clinical depression, anxiety, and traumatic stress symptoms (Gershon, 2009). In other words, police officer depression, suicidal ideation, and suicide are not primarily driven by traumatic calls, but are instead driven by factors internal to the department or organization (Chae & Boyle, 2013). These studies suggest that while the initial incident likely induced negative reactions in the officers, the most significant byproducts of these events were feeling abandoned by the department.
There is also significant thought around a never-ending and increasingly voluminous work-load leading to organizational stress in law enforcement. Police officers, probably more so than the general population, “juggle work, family, and community in a never-ending blur of activity” because of their intimate involvement in so many other people’s lives (Senge, 2006, p. 146). While the necessary solution is to proactively manage the workload, many people often turn to unhealthy means to cope with organizational stress.
Alcohol Consumption
One principle of the Fifth Discipline (Senge, 2006) is that the coping mechanism may be more detrimental than the initial condition. In other words, “the cure can be worse than the disease” (Senge, 2006, p. 88). As one example, police officers often deal with stress and fatigue with alcohol. The literature estimates that police alcohol use may be as high as twice the level of the general population, with some studies even suggesting that policing is simply a drinking culture. Given this higher rate of consumption, previous studies have attempted to identify causal factors including the belief that police officers drink because of the occupational stress induced by long shifts, lack of supervisory support, and organizational changes, in addition to homicides, suicides, and other violent crimes. Senge affirms this idea by noting that social drinking is often “a solution to the problem of low self-esteem or work-related stress” (Senge, 2006, p. 88). In their 2009 research, Lindsay & Shelley discovered that stress, being social, and fitting in were the most significant factors in determining alcohol consumption. The officers in this study most at risk of hazardous alcohol consumption were young, white, and single officers who were working dayshift with a need to socially fit in (Lindsay & Shelley, 2009). As a central nervous system depressant, alcohol impairs decision making, increases impulsivity, and exacerbates depressive symptoms. Many of the suicides in these studies note the presence of alcohol as a contributing factor.
The Figure Eight of Stress and Alcohol
The Fifth Discipline (Senge, 2006) discusses the pattern of behavior in shifting the burden, specifically with stress and alcohol. “Stress builds, which leads to more alcohol, which relieves stress, which leads to less perceived need to adjust workload, which leads to more workload, which leads to more stress” in a self-sustaining pattern of behavior. Over time, while the symptoms are temporarily relieved, the individual officer’s general health begins to deteriorate. Generally, the longer the cycle continues, the more difficult it is to correct (Senge, 2006).
The only way to break this cycle is to strengthen the fundamental response and simultaneously weaken the symptomatic response (Senge, 2006). In other words, when dealing with alcoholism, the fundamental response requires “that people face their addiction on the one hand, while offering support groups and training to help them rehabilitate on the other” (Senge, 2006, p. 154). Following this logic, officers could form peer support groups to illuminate and acknowledge their drinking habits while simultaneously supporting stress reduction strategies. Through this approach, officers are able to understand the importance of addressing systemic issues over surface-level symptoms.
Overcoming the Cycle
There are a number of ideas from Theory U (Scharmer, 2018) to help officers overcome this cycle. First, they must examine their blind spot to determine their interior condition, which is likely visible through drinking alcohol, but also includes the less visible stress manifestations. Then, they can build a holding space for a “generative social process” with actionable steps and strategies (Scharmer, 2018, p. 33). In that space, and having raised awareness of the issues thus far, they can create mindfulness and dialogue to make the system see itself.
In other words, law enforcement needs to be able to self-reflect as an occupation and engage in productive dialogue, which is for the system to see its own limitations and assumptions. For example, there are clear linkages among stress, coping mechanisms, and mental health. These linkages can be explored to generate new understanding that drives systemic change. These changes will necessarily go far beyond the symptoms of stress and depression to delve deeper and ultimately save the lives of law enforcement officers nationwide.
References
Allison, P., Mnatsakanova, A., McCanlies, E., Fekedulegn, D., Hartley, T. A., Andrew, M. E., & Violanti, J. M. (2019). Police stress and depressive symptoms: role of coping and hardiness. Policing (Bradford, England), 43(2), 247–261. https://doi.org/10.1108/pijpsm-04-2019-0055
Carlier, I., Lamberts, R. and Gersons, B. (1997), “Risk factors for posttraumatic stress symptomology in police officers: a prospective analysis”, The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 185, 498-506.
Chae, M. H., & Boyle, D. J. (2013). Police suicide: Prevalence, risk, and protective factors. Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management, 36(1), 91-118.
Denhardt, R. B., Denhardt, J. V., Aristigueta, M. P., (2016). Managing Human Behavior in Public and Nonprofit Organizations. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications.
Gau, J. M., Terrill, W., & Paoline III, E. A. (2013). Looking up: Explaining police [VS1] promotional aspirations. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 40(3), 247-269.
Gershon, R.M., Barocas, B., Canton, A.N., Li, X. and Vlahov, D. (2009), “Mental, physical, and behavioral outcomes associated with perceived work stress in police officers”, Criminal Justice and Behavior, 36, 275-289.
Lindsay, V., & Shelley, K. (2009). Social and stress-related influences of police officers’ alcohol consumption. Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology, 24(2), 87-92. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11896-009-9048-9
Papazoglou, K., Koskelainen, M., Tuttle, B. M., & Pitel, M. (2017). Examining the role of police compassion fatigue and negative personality traits in impeding the promotion of police compassion satisfaction: A brief report. Journal of Law Enforcement, 6(3), 1-14.
Plaxton-Hennings, C. (2004), “Law enforcement organizational behavior and the occurrence of posttraumatic stress symptomology in law enforcement personnel following a critical incident”, Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology, 19, 53-63.
Queiros, C., Kaiseler, M., & Da Silva, A. L. (2013). Burnout as a predictor of aggressivity among police officers. European Journal of Policing Studies, 1(2), 110-135.
Russell, L. M., Cole, B. M., & Jones III, R. J. (2014). High-risk occupations: How leadership, stress, and ability to cope influence burnout in law enforcement. Journal of Leadership, Accountability and Ethics, 11(3), 49.
Scharmer, O. (2018). The essentials of Theory U: Core principles and applications. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
Senge, P. M. (2006). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. Broadway Business.
Vila, B., & Kenney, D. J. (2002). Tired Cops: The Prevalence and Potential Consequences of Police Fatigue. National Institute of Justice Journal, 248. doi:10.1037/e527842006-003
Vila, B., Morrison, G. B., & Kenney, D. J. (2002). Improving Shift Schedule and Work-Hour Policies and Practices to Increase Police Officer Performance, Health, and Safety. Police Quarterly, 5(1), 4-24. doi:10.1177/109861102129197995
Violanti, J. M., Mnatsakanova, A., Andrew, M. E., Allison, P., Gu, J. K., & Fekedulegn, D. (2018). Effort-Reward Imbalance and Overcommitment at Work: Associations With Police Burnout. Police quarterly, 21(4), 440–460. https://doi.org/10.1177/1098611118774764
Violanti, J. M., & Steege, A. (2021). Law enforcement worker suicide: an updated national assessment. Policing: An International Journal, 44(1), 18-31. https://doi.org/10.1108/PIJPSM0920190157
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