Police Identity:
The Multiple Identities of Male Police Officers
Kyle J. Callahan
Research Writing: English 202
Professor Harrison
March 2, 2010
2
Introduction
Male police officers, by nature of the job, face stressful situations and are placed into events with no prior knowledge of what can or will happen. Such events as a routine traffic stop can turn out to be the last for the officer. Male officers have many different personas they must put on in order to successfully do their job and be successful after they have left the job site. This can be a problem. With so much stress from the day they may be apt to take it home with them. They may become alcoholics, violent offenders, or disconnect with their family and friends. Researcher Michael Arter cites, “Law enforcement has been identified as one of the most stressful occupations, both in the United States and worldwide (Anshel 2000).”[1] He also cites, “Consequently, police officers experience higher mortality rates, higher rates of coronary disease, and higher rates of alcohol abuse and clinical depression as compared to the general population (Toch 2002).”[2] Officers confront different situations daily, “Although the “fight or flight” option is available to the general population, and utilized on a daily basis in numerous situations, such an option is not available to police officers.”[3] In turn, officers must maintain the situation while first, keeping their lives safe, the bystanders safe, and finally if possible the suspect in question.
When coming home to the family environment officers must separate their lives. Many may come to the conclusion that officer’s family marriage lives are affect heavily from their job. Laurence miller says, “Actually, considering the stresses and challenges of law enforcement work, it may seem surprising that the marriages and family lives of these professionals do not seem to differ dramatically from those of workers in other fields.”[4] Miller goes further to explain that the stress experienced is from the spouse. Over 75% of the officer’s spouses report degrees of stress experienced from the job.[5] Miller says, “Stereotypical “tough guy” macho values and attitudes-among both male and female…pervade the law enforcement culture (Miller, 1995, 1999, 2003, 2004, 2006).”[6] When dealing with the persona of an officer they usually lack the necessary sentiment needed for a healthy relationship. When, “On the job, law enforcement officers must maintain a keen sense of alertness, vigilance, and mental preparedness, which often includes an occupationally reinforced suspiciousness and general distrust of people’s motives, statements, and actions (Blum, 2000; Duran, 1999; Garner, 2005).[7] This is generally carried with them everywhere they go. Miller talks about how the held back anger and frustration, “may spill out into verbal abuse or physical violence at home.”[8]
The research being conducted is about how a male officer must find multiple identities within themselves. It is crucial that they do this because of the huge stresses that they face. Robert Merton expanded the idea of General Strain Theory with anomie. He dug deeper with individual strain theory. He focused on, “the individual and the intimate environment as determinate of reactive behaviors to strain. Negative relationships and the desire to avoid negative situations are the primary motivations identified in general strain theory.”[9] With this theory it is believed that the officer will turn to deviance in order to release the stress experienced on the job. The deviance can occur in as stated above domestic abuse with the officer’s spouse. With the research being conducted I will prove the multiple personalities that are within the officer and when they cannot cope with them properly they are apt to fail at either their job or their personal life. Officers from Indiana Borough, Pennsylvania State Police, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and a small municipality will be interviewed. They will be asked questions pertaining to how they view their selves as a police officer, what it means to them to be a police officer, how they cope with work and family life and what their largest stresses of their job are. The research will focus on male officers with more than 2 years of experience. Their rank, age, race, and where they are from will not influence how the research will be conducted. However, it may influence their personal feelings of the questions that will be asked. The research will prove how male officers develop multiple personalities over a course of a career.
[1] Arter, Michael L. “Stress and Deviance in Policing.” Deviant Behavior 29, no. 1 (January 2008): 43-69. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[2] Arter, Michael L. “Stress and Deviance in Policing.” Deviant Behavior 29, no. 1 (January 2008): 43-69. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[3] Arter, Michael L. “Stress and Deviance in Policing.” Deviant Behavior 29, no. 1 (January 2008): 43-69. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[4] Miller, Laurence. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1 (January 2007): 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[5] Miller, Laurence. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1 (January 2007): 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost
[6] Miller, Laurence. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1 (January 2007): 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost
[7] Miller, Laurence. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1 (January 2007): 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost
[8] Miller, Laurence. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1 (January 2007): 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost
[9] Arter, Michael L. “Stress and Deviance in Policing.” Deviant Behavior 29, no. 1 (January 2008): 43-69. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
Bibliography
1. Arter, Michael L. “Stress and Deviance in Policing.” Deviant Behavior 29, no. 1 (January 2008): 43-69. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
2. Miller, Laurence. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1 (January 2007): 21-40. Academic Search .
Literature Review
The first piece of literature, “Stress and Deviance in Policing” gives the argument that police officer’s commit acts of deviance based on the strain theory. The author’s idea is that based on Strain theory an officer can either succumb to the pressures around them (bad) or they can overcome their environment. The author is stating that psychological stresses faced within the job can impact how they will react. The methods used in this paper were studying officers who were assigned to undercover work. It was focused on the individual not the whole group. Arter believes that there are numerous reasons that deviance occurs. His methods of research were both categorically and individually as stated before. In his research he extended the idea of General Strain Theory to encompass adults. Arter states, “this study provides insight into the nature of stress inherent within differing policing assignments and on the value of adaptive coping strategies to mediate such stress.” [1] Arter’s limitations include: having a larger sample, the fact that only under cover officers were used in the study, finally other theoretical explanations can be considered.
The second piece of literature that I found very useful was “Acute stress and performance in police recruits”. This particular piece of research was different from the others because it measured how new police recruits deal with stress and what factors play into their decision-making processes during that stress. This study deals primarily with the biological and psychological factors that stress has on their performance. The methods used in this study had 84 police recruits and measured their physiological states such as heart rate (HR), blood pressure (BP) and Salivary cortisol. Psychological measures included state anxiety or STAI. The recruits were videotaped during their performance in a Firearms Training Systems (FATS) which played scenarios that could be faced on the job. Their performances were rated by experts in the field of law enforcement. Pre-test of FATS included interviews, measurement of STAI, HR, BP, and salivary cortisol. Post-test the participants were again interviewed; BP, HR, STAI and salivary cortisol were again measured. The results draw correlations between stress and performance. In conclusion of the study it showed that stress can either play a negative role causing “tunnel vision” or a positive role causing “a widening of the senses.”[2]
The third piece of literature that was important in my research was “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” This study comes from The American Journal of Family Therapy. The main discussion of this article deals primarily with the stresses of police work on the family. I found this article crucial because I want to know how the family life is affected with police officers. The one piece of the article titled, “Divided Loyalties: Job Commitment vs. Family Commitment” highlights the different problems that the spouse may have with the officer. The author states, “Another aspect of law enforcement culture is the formation of powerful bonds of solidarity among fellow officers and boundaries around this tribal inner circle that exclude nonmembers.” [3] The author goes on to say how “The officer’s spouse may feel left out, often leading to jealousy, as the officer seems to be far more involved with his departmental clanmates than with his marital soul mate and their family.”[4] This section also talks about overprotectiveness on the officer’s behalf. Miller says that “Many officers try to create a “protective bubble” (Reese, 1987) around their families to shield them from the unsavory and distressing aspects of their work, as well as to make the officer’s home a separate haven from the pressures of the job.”[5] The final subsection that is included is called “Suspiciousness and Hypervigilance”. A very interesting point that Miller cites is, “On the job, law enforcement officers must maintain a keen sense of alertness, vigilance, and mental preparedness, which often includes an occupationally reinforced suspiciousness and general distrust of people’s motives, statements, and actions (Blum, 2000; Duran, 1999; Garner, 2005).”[6] This is usually carried into the home life of the officer. Many perceive this as a paranoid attitude.
The final article that I have found to be most important to me in my research is “Risk Taking and Police Pursuit.” Authors Homant, Kennedy, and Howton explore the measures of risk taking and sensation seeking with the participants being 69 American officers. The method of research was collected data from one department who also answered anymous surveys. A sensation seeking scale was used to record how likely an officer was to engage in a high speed pursuit. In the results, 75% of the “department’s officers reported that they had initiated at least one police pursuit during the previous 12 months.”[7] The main idea of this study was to see how personality traits played a role if an officer was more likely to engage in a high speed pursuit.
Bibliography
Arter, Michael L. “Stress and Deviance in Policing.” Deviant Behavior 29, no. 1 (January 2008): 43-69. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
Homant, Robert J., Daniel B. Kennedy, and Jimmy D. Howton. “Risk Taking and Police Pursuit.” Journal of Social Psychology 134, no. 2 (April 1994): 213-221. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
Miller, Laurence. 2007. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1: 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
Regehr, Cheryl, et al. “Acute stress and performance in police recruits.” Stress & Health: Journal of the International Society for the Investigation of Stress 24, no. 4 (October 2008): 295-303. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[1] Arter, Michael L. “Stress and Deviance in Policing.” Deviant Behavior 29, no. 1 (January 2008): 43-69. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[2] Regehr, Cheryl, et al. “Acute stress and performance in police recruits.” Stress & Health: Journal of the International Society for the Investigation of Stress 24, no. 4 (October 2008): 295-303. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[3] Miller, Laurence. 2007. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1: 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[4] Miller, Laurence. 2007. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1: 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[5] Miller, Laurence. 2007. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1: 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[6] Miller, Laurence. 2007. “Police Families: Stresses, Syndromes, and Solutions.” American Journal of Family Therapy 35, no. 1: 21-40. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
[7] Homant, Robert J., Daniel B. Kennedy, and Jimmy D. Howton. “Risk Taking and Police Pursuit.” Journal of Social Psychology 134, no. 2 (April 1994): 213-221. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost.
Methods
Participants: The participants for this research project were five male police officers. Two from the Pennsylvania (PA) State Troopers, one from Indiana Borough, one Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP) Campus Police and one from a small municipality. These men were not randomly selected and demographics did not play a role into selection. The only pre-requisites needed were officers who had served more than two years with their department of that had more than two years of policing experience.
Materials: The materials used in gathering this data were as follows: e-mail exchange, timed questionnaire (10-15 minute limit to finish), and pen and pad. The reason this was used is because it is based on interviews with the officers.
Design: The officers present in a setting where only the researcher and the officer were secluded. It was a one on one setting. The group used in this experiment was five male police officers. Variables such as demographics and rank were not accounted for.
Procedure: The officer’s were handed a series of questions to which they had 10 to 15 minutes to complete. They were asked questions to how they perceive their selves in each setting. The settings included at work, family, and friends. These setting were chosen because each has different variables to how the officer may act and perceive their self. The researcher also used e-mail exchange to keep in contact with the participants if a question was not specified by the participant
