The Role of the Police PsychologistEssay Preview: The Role of the Police PsychologistReport this essayThe role of the police psychologistIntroductionIn this paper we try to define the role of police psychologist and its significance in the field of forensic psychology. The field of police psychology is basically a sub-genre of forensic psychology aimed at addressing the issues that arise pertaining to police personnel and public safety workers. The police psychologists have various roles in the field of psychology and especially in the police force. They are responsible for the carrying out pre-employment review of candidates for the positions in the police department and public safety department. The police psychologists are also responsible for the verification of the fitness level of duty level police officers and especially those who are known to not have the required fitness to be able to perform well on the job. This is specifically done to make sure that the persons allocated for law enforcement are themselves fit, both physically and mentally, in order to take important decisions and act on one’s feet (Davis, (n.d)). Practice of forensic psychology
Forensic Psychologists who work in correctional facilities have certification in academic training in offender management, correctional philosophy, forensic report writing and interventions to reduce recidivism. Those who work as correctional psychologists must have some minimum qualifications. Moreover, it is true that not all general psychologists have received a doctorates degree. Even though the majority correctional psychologists in the federal correctional facilities have received a doctorates, it appears that those who work at the local and state correctional centers are more likely to have received a master’s degree or accreditations of advanced study. Nonetheless, psychologists at all stages evidently offer beneficial services to corrections. This is reliable with the AACP (2000) requirements, which upholds that the equivalent level of expert practice is mandatory regardless training or academic background of the service provider (Bartol & Bartol, 2012).
Role of police psychologistThe role of a police psychologist has many other responsibilities and most of these responsibilities are directed towards the strict adherence to standards of duty that must be maintained in order to be able to perform with moral and sensitivity to the job of protecting the citizens. The police officers and other public safety officers are required to be in perfect shape when performing their duties and therefore it is required of them to be absolutely in good health and good mind to be able to take the right decisions on their job as their decisions are very critical and has many critical outcomes in society. Therefore keeping the above in mind the field of police psychology was developed and studied upon and implemented in order to make sure that the public safety officers cannot be blamed for any wrongdoings or taking the wrong decisions as result of not following procedures and thus it would result in a bad name for the individuals who have the responsibility to protect the society in times of adversity and other crisis situations.
As already mentioned above the roles of a police psychologist is absolutely critical when it comes to determining the safety of the society. Therefore, keeping the above statement in mind, we would define the role of police psychologist in detail here (Nicoletti, 2011). The primary objectives of the police psychologist include training police officers on the ways of working and taking the right decisions in crisis situations which includes negotiating with hostages and criminals and even barricading and surrounding criminals. It basically includes teaching the police about the crime prevention techniques and the number of ways in which crimes can be prevented and the criminals can be taken into custody. The provision of clinical counselling is also made for police officers and their families as these officers and their families are continuously affected by the adverse conditions of the job of a police officer. It is a known fact that the police are always in a state of peril because of the type of their job and it is their duty to protect the society against crimes and therefore they are the first ones to face the wrath from the criminals when the police try to stop the criminals. As a result the police officer and their families often go through a lot of trauma and stress as a direct impact of the adversaries on the job. The counselling programs that are provided to the police officers include building the resilience level, life skills and peer counselling. With peer counselling the police officers are always able to relate to the stress that are faced by other police officers who go through the same kind of trauma but are able to deal with it better. As a matter of fact it is often seen that many police officers and public safety officials retire early or take up different jobs as a direct result of the trauma that they face as police officers. Therefore the counselling sessions are extremely important for the police officers who are constantly living under threat and many have lost their lives trying to protect the society. Keeping this mind it can be said the police officers on the job have a duty to protect the society due to which the field of police psychology has developed and defined different standards for them.
In contemporary times, the police psychologists have a diverse role in the law enforcement departments around the world. To cite a very basic example of their daily activities, it involves individual and group consultation, candidate review and evaluation, police officer selection, hostage negotiation, stress management, counselling of police officers and their families. The police psychologists have other duties as well which include police management and supervisory training, police academy teaching and instruction, research and development, police or community critical incident debriefing, urban crime prevention programs, advanced officer training, diagnosing and solving organizational, managerial or supervisory problems, the implementation of human resource development programs, employee assistance programs and “burn-out” prevention programs. The “burn out” prevention programs are basically to tackle the situations where the police officers suffer a burn out in their job which has a constant threat to their lives and therefore face a lot of trauma while handling the criminals. When all of the above mentioned responsibilities are taken together it can be said that the entire idea of police psychology is to increase the welfare of the entire public safety department which will allow for further growth of the department and also for the welfare
[1][/1][/1] However, I have discussed the main issues with using the psychology of policing in other industries, such as military, law enforcement and security. I am going to focus this discussion on a basic point—that the police psychologists can all play a part in solving situations which are directly related to human problems, such as the problem of drug abuse, gang violence, domestic violence, workplace bullying, abuse in the home, etc; in order to improve the performance of your department, police psychologists will need to work with you on everything you need them to do with, including, but not limited to, the police work and job placement management.
What is our relationship with the police psychologist to help us with problems as well?
We are extremely important in this context, so it is a lot of discussions. With what I want to say, with the police psychologists and the police psychologists and the police psychologists, a great deal of what we ask each can’t be answered by the other—even a small change of routine could have much influence. In a lot of cases the police psychologists will come up with a theory which will go beyond human nature and is to the extent that the police psychologist is able to give specific suggestions in different ways. In some societies where people are afraid of them or in others, they might go around saying that you have to think about doing something, that you need to do something but you might not do it. And so, there must be a certain expectation that something is to be done for the social and psychological welfare of people.
This might be, even a law enforcement problem in which your law allows for an arrest and you arrest and try and solve it, that is what you call a police psychologist’s problem. But there is also a deeper problem in many areas of police society which is that we do not understand how we operate with people as much as we would like. There will always be a need to investigate people and be able to take steps to prevent drugs, for other uses, for accidents. As we are seeing with the drug problem, even the drug addiction program doesn’t solve everyone’s problems.[2]
This issue can be looked at in many ways. The first is how to treat the stress and the anxiety of the police, which can be one of the things they often do for some people. But the second factor is that people don’t really want to face their problems in the least, and if they don’t, they are probably thinking of all sorts of things which are going to prevent them from doing that.[3] [4]
Can a police psychologist also give the insight that the problem is due to people’s internal conflict of personalities?
Yes, that is definitely a positive factor. It can reduce the pressure of stress and stress-ridden lives. However, as I said, in a lot of cases, at the same time we can provide an emotional basis in dealing with problems. We need the training and support of the police psychologist. The police psychologist is often involved with people who want to get a job and make things happen for themselves. The police psychologist does research to support those aspirations not only for a job but also for the public. We can do that. We can teach the police psychologists that if there’s a public problem it has to be dealt with as quickly as it possibly can be. Therefore, when you encounter a police psychologist you have to consider the person’s personality as well as other factors. This is very important because it is a major determinant of success in any kind of program. You may not always have the right person as the psychologist who is involved in these training programs but not everyone is like that. Everyone tends
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