Adaptive potential of law enforcement officers as a resource to overcome professional burnout

Abstract

Introduction. The phenomenon of “professional burnout”appears to be of special interest among scientists. Although there have been many studies of the nature of its occurrence and dynamics, there is no unity in understanding the ways to prevent and correct changes of mental and socio-psychological functions caused by personalitydeformation. According to A. K. Markova, specialists of “human-human” professions, working constantly with people, are more at risk of professional deformation than employees of “human-technology” and “human-nature” professions. Supporting this idea, we should note that under conditions of high responsibility, pressure and increasing demandsnot always corresponding the inner resources, this problem becomes especially important. The destructive effect affects mental process and personal characteristics, leading to negative changes in the professional activities of police officers. The mission of police officers to protect the public against criminals and other unlawful encroachments becomes, metaphorically speaking, “transparent” due to professional burnout, in particular, depersonalisation (negligent approach to duties and cynical attitude towards citizens). That is why, it is important to determine in time individuals being more prone to professional burnout, to reveal signs indicating its occurrence, and to develop a methodology stimulating adaptive potential and extension of tunnel thinking provoked by high stress. Methods. The following psychological methods were used: the method of assessment of adaptive abilities - “MOAS” (developed on the basis of Kettell’s Test). This method helped to assess the respondents’ personal characteristics “closeness – sociability”, “emotional instability - emotional stability”, “shyness – courage”, “trustfulness – suspiciousness”, “self-confidence – anxiety”, “relaxation – tension”; the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) adapted by N. E. Vodopyanova, which helped to determine the level of professional burnout on the following three scales: emotional exhaustion, depersonalisation, and reduction of professional achievements; thePearson correlationmethod (statistical analysis of the data). Results. The results determined four groups of respondents: with high, satisfactory, low, unsatisfactory levels of adaptive potential. The majority of respondents (70.5 %) have insufficient adaptive potential for coping with stressful situations, rational assessment of requirements and personal resources. Besides, employees with low level of adaptive abilities are more prone to professional burnout, especially depersonalisation.