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The Impact of Resilience Training on Occupational Stress, Resilience, Job Satisfaction, and Psychological Well-being of Female Police Officers

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Abstract

Despite many studies on police stress, there is little research on interventions to promote their well-being. Moreover, most studies of police stress have been predominately on male samples, with female police officers often being neglected. On this premise, the purpose of the present study was to develop and determine the efficacy of resilience training program by evaluating its impact on occupational stress, resilience, job satisfaction, and psychological well-being. Two hundred and fifty female police officers from the Southern part of India were recruited for the study. The study adopted a pre-post-follow-up research design. Resilience training with components such as self-awareness, positive attitude, emotional management, and interpersonal skills were developed uniquely for this study, based on protective model of resilience. Sixty-three female police officers, who fulfilled the criteria, were randomly assigned into two groups namely, experimental (n = 33) and control group (n = 30). Resilience training was given to the experimental group thrice a week for nearly 2 months, and control group was not given any training. Data were collected at three time periods, i.e., before training, a week after training, and 2 months after training. The statistical analysis, using repeated measures analysis of variance (RMANOVA) was carried out. The results revealed that resilience training was effective in enhancing resilience, job satisfaction, and psychological well-being of female police officers and in reducing occupational stress. Medium effect sizes were reported. The qualitative feedback was positive regarding the resilience training program, supporting the empirical evidence for the effectiveness of resilience training program. The study had implications for theory and practice in police research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Manas—A Pursuit of happiness, 105A/23A, Sivan Koil Street, Kodambakkam, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, 600024, India

    T. Chitra

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Madras, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, 600005, India

    S. Karunanidhi

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Correspondence to T. Chitra.

Appendices

Appendix 1

Armed Reserve

A unit of Tamil Nadu Police, which deals with major law and order duties. Female police officers in these units are generally kept in reserve to handle riots in times of emergency. They also look after escorting accused or under trials to the courts or to the lock-ups, guard duty in important places like banks, etc. The female police officers working in the armed reserve carry armed weapons during riots. They are required to work 24/7-time schedule and work in shifts.

Sample Site

The Chennai city in Tamil Nadu state, Southern part of India is divided into three zones namely, North, South, and Central Zone. Here, female police officers work in various units like AR, All Women Police Stations (AWPS), Local Police Stations (LPS), and in Battalions. The ratio of female and male in police is 1:11 in this city. Constables are at the last in the organization structure of Chennai police, with Commissioner of Police (COP) at the top, followed by Joint Commissioner of Police (JCP), Deputy Commissioner of Police (DC), Assistant Commissioner of Police (AC), inspector, Sub-Inspector (SI) and head constables. According to the handbook on police department, as of July 2012, the total number of female police officers employed in the constable rank is nearly four times higher than those employed in all other ranks.

Occupational Stress

Occupational stress is defined as degree of unpleasant feelings and emotions experienced by policewomen when they are exposed to various stressors in their occupation (Karunanidhi and Chitra 2014a, p. 191). The definitions of the sub-dimensions of occupational stress are given below (Karunanidhi and Chitra 2014a, p. 197):

  • Operational hassles: It is the stress experienced while carrying out everyday duty which includes, dealing with abusive cases, handling riots, making forcible arrests, etc.

  • External factors: It is the stress arising out of external pressure other than police department such as public, politicians, judicial system, and media. It involves stress due to non-cooperation of public, interference from advocates, Government officials.

  • Hazards of occupation: It is the stress experienced by women police due to the vulnerability attached with the nature of their job such as hectic work schedule, working during holidays, unpredictable work locations, hurried eating.

  • Physical working condition: It is the stress experienced by women police due to certain aspects of their physical work environment such as poor infrastructure (lack of space), unhygienic working condition, inadequate manpower, poor basic facilities.

  • Women-related stress: It is the stress experienced uniquely by women police because of their gender and the resulting poor status in the department. This involves performing duty during menstruation, facing negative attitude of co-workers and poor image of women in society.

  • Supervisory stress: It is the stress experienced by women police due to the behavior of their immediate supervisors. This includes lack of recognition, ill-treatment, domination, and humiliation by supervisors.

Resilience

Resilience is a multidimensional characteristic that embodies the personal qualities that enable one to thrive in the face of adversity (Connor and Davidson 2003).

Job Satisfaction

A pleasurable or positive emotional state resulting from the appraisal of one’s job or job experiences (Locke 1976).

Psychological Well-being

Self-reflective expressions on specific measures describing particular affective states (Dupuy 1984). The scale includes six dimensions: anxiety, depressed mood, positive well-being, self-control, general health, and vitality.

Resilience Training

It is a program aimed to improve protective factors such as self-awareness, positive attitude towards self, job, and life, emotional management, and interpersonal skills in female police officers. This program is developed to help female police officers become resilient, to deal proactively with exposure to stress in their occupation, to improve job satisfaction and consequently their psychological well-being.

Appendix 2

  • Two bilingual translators translated the original version of PGWBI and CD-RISC scale into Tamil independently.

  • The researcher along with two bilingual translators compared the translated version item by item to agree upon a prefinal translated Tamil version of PGWBI and CD-RISC scale.

  • Two bilingual experts back translated the tools into English to establish meaning equivalence.

  • The prefinal translated Tamil version was tried on ten illiterate people aged 20 years and above and on ten female police officers to examine the comprehensibility of the translated version of PGWBI and CD-RISC scale.

  • Few modifications were carried out to the original tools to suit the Indian population.

  • The original English, the final Tamil version of the two tools, and back-translated English version of the final Tamil version of the same tools were referred to five bilingual psychologists to assess the equivalence of the translated version of the tools.

  • The Tamil versions of the two tools were finalized after five experts from the field of psychology agreed that the tools had very high-balancing meaning and lingual equivalence. Thus, the content validity was established for the Tamil version of the two tools.

  • Pilot study was carried out to establish reliability for the translated tools.

  • The test-retest reliability value for the Tamil version of CD-RISC scale was 0.76 and the test-retest reliability value for the Tamil version of PGWBI ranged from 0.68 to 0.78.

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Chitra, T., Karunanidhi, S. The Impact of Resilience Training on Occupational Stress, Resilience, Job Satisfaction, and Psychological Well-being of Female Police Officers. J Police Crim Psych 36, 8–23 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11896-018-9294-9

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