Browsing by Author "Pereira, Anabela"
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- Burnout and stress measurement in police officers: Literature review and a study with the operational police stress questionnairePublication . Queirós, Cristina; Passos, Fernando; Bártolo, Ana; Silva Marques, António da; Silva, Carlos Fernandes da; Pereira, AnabelaResearch has demonstrated that policing is a stressful occupation and that this stresshas a negative impact on police officers’ mental and physical health, performance, andinteractions with citizens. Mental health at the workplace has become a concern dueto the costs of depression, anxiety, burnout, and even suicide, which is high amongpolice officers. To ameliorate occupational health, it is therefore crucial to identify stressand burnout levels on a regular basis. However, the instruments frequently used tomeasure stress have not valorized the specificity of policing tasks. This study aims to: (i)conduct a literature review to identify questionnaires used to assess occupational stressand burnout among police officers; (ii) analyze the psychometric characteristics of aPortuguese version of Operational Police Stress Questionnaire (PSQ-Op); and, usingthe PSQ-Op and other questionnaires, (iii) to identify operational stress, burnout, anddistress levels among Portuguese police officers. The literature review identified 108studies which use a multiplicity of questionnaires to measure burnout or occupationalstress among police officers, but few studies use specific police stress questionnaires.Sample sizes were mostly below 500 participants and studies were mainly developedin the last decade in the USA and Brazil, but also in another 24 countries, showing theextent of the interest in this topic. This study applied to 2057 police officers from theNational Portuguese Police, a force policing urban centers, and used the PSQ-Op, aswell the Spanish Burnout Inventory and the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale. Theresults show that the psychometric properties of the Portuguese version of PSQ-Op areadequate. Factorial analysis revealed two dimensions defined as social and work issues,which were associated with measures of distress and burnout. Fit indices suggested asecond-order solution called operational police stress. Overall, and considering the scalerange of each questionnaire, the results showed moderate values of operational stress,distress, and burnout. However, considering their cut-off points, 85% of the samplepresented high operational stress levels, 11% critical values for burnout, and 28% highdistress levels, with 55% of the sample at risk of a psychological disorder. These resultsreinforce the need to prevent stress and to invest in police officers’ occupational health.
- Job stress, burnout and coping in police officers: Relationships and psychometric properties of the organizational police stress questionnairePublication . Queirós, Cristina; Passos, Fernando; Bártolo, Ana; Faria, Sara; Fonseca, Sílvia Monteiro; Marques, António; Silva, Carlos F.; Pereira, AnabelaPolicing is a stressful occupation, which impairs police officers’ physical/mental health and elicits burnout, aggressive behaviors and suicide. Resilience and coping facilitate the management of job stress policing, which can be operational or organizational. All these constructs are associated, and they must be assessed by instruments sensitive to policing idiosyncrasies. This study aims to identify operational and organizational stress, burnout, resilient coping and coping strategies among police officers, as well to analyze the psychometric properties of a Portuguese version of the Organizational Police Stress Questionnaire. A cross-sectional study, with online questionnaires, collected data of 1131 police officers. With principal components and confirmatory factor analysis, PSQ-org revealed adequate psychometric properties, despite the exclusion of four items, and revealed a structure with two factors (poor management and lack of resources, and responsibilities and burden). Considering cut-off points, 88.4% police officers presented high operational stress, 87.2% high organizational stress, 10.9% critical values for burnout and 53.8% low resilient coping, preferring task-orientated than emotion and avoidance coping. Some differences were found according to gender, age and job experience. Job stress and burnout correlated negatively with resilient coping, enthusiasm towards job and task-orientated coping. Results reinforce the importance to invest on police officers’ occupational health.