Factors affecting health of the police officials: mediating role of job stress

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the prevalence of stress among police officers and the impact of it on their health. Design/methodology/approach – A survey was conducted in randomly selected four cities from the state of Uttarakhand, India. A total of 444 police officers below the inspector-level ranks from eight police stations participated in this study. Structural equation modeling was used to examine the inter-relationship between the factors affecting health and assessing the mediating role of stress. Findings – Findings revealed that organization politics and work overload held a positive relationship whereas perceived organization support had an inverse relation with stress. Work overload was found to be the highest contributor in causing stress with a strong positive relationship value of 0.52 with stress. Further, stress had a strong impact on the health of the police officers, indicated by the direct relation with a value of 0.55. Research limitations/implications – The study is limited to the geographical area of Uttarakhand. Findings revealed that the health of the policemen was highly affected by the stressful work environment and work overload. Hence, higher authorities of the police department are required to pay attention on the welfare activities of the force to improve the prevailing situation. Originality/value – This study would be contributing to the literature available in Indian context by discussing the various antecedents of stress among the police officers.