A prospective study of predictors of depression symptoms in police

Police work is one of the most stressful occupations. Previous research has indicated that work stress and trauma exposure may place individuals at heightened risk for the development of depression symptomatology. This prospective longitudinal study was designed to examine predictors of depression symptoms in police service. Participants comprised 119 healthy police recruits from an ongoing prospective study. They completed baseline measures of depression symptoms, childhood trauma exposure, neuroticism, and self-worth during academy training. Follow-up measures of depression symptoms, PTSD symptoms, critical incident exposure, negative life events, and routine work environment stress were assessed after 12 months of police service. Hierarchical linear regression analysis was conducted to examine predictors of current levels of depression symptoms, controlling for baseline depression symptoms and current PTSD symptoms. Greater childhood trauma exposure, lower self-worth during training, and greater perceived work stress in the first year of police service predicted greater depression symptoms at 12 months. Depression symptoms at 1 year of police service were partly independent from PTSD symptoms at 12 months. Greater childhood trauma exposure and lower self-worth during training may be important variables to screen as risk factors for duty-related depression. Strategies to reduce routine work environment stress have the potential to decrease duty-related depression in law enforcement.

[1]  C. MacLeod,et al.  Cognitive vulnerability to emotional disorders. , 2005, Annual review of clinical psychology.

[2]  Roger Bolus,et al.  Psychometric Properties of the Early Trauma Inventory–Self Report , 2007, The Journal of nervous and mental disease.

[3]  A. Roy,et al.  Childhood trauma and suicide attempts in patients with unipolar depression , 2007, Depression and anxiety.

[4]  C. Nemeroff,et al.  The Dexamethasone/Corticotropin-Releasing Factor Test in Men with Major Depression: Role of Childhood Trauma , 2008, Biological Psychiatry.

[5]  P. A. Collins,et al.  Stress in police officers: a study of the origins, prevalence and severity of stress-related symptoms within a county police force. , 2003, Occupational medicine.

[6]  M. Trevisan,et al.  The Buffalo Cardio-Metabolic Occupational Police Stress (BCOPS) pilot study: methods and participant characteristics. , 2006, Annals of epidemiology.

[7]  A. Stoep,et al.  Cognitive Features Associated With Depressive Symptoms in Adolescence: Directionality and Specificity , 2007, Journal of clinical child and adolescent psychology : the official journal for the Society of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, American Psychological Association, Division 53.

[8]  R. Sinha,et al.  Childhood maltreatment, perceived stress, and stress-related coping in recently abstinent cocaine dependent adults. , 2007, Psychology of addictive behaviors : journal of the Society of Psychologists in Addictive Behaviors.

[9]  E. Fisher,et al.  Depressive symptoms after lung cancer surgery: their relation to coping style and social support , 2006, Psycho-oncology.

[10]  D. Weiss,et al.  Routine occupational stress and psychological distress in police , 2002 .

[11]  K. Farkas,et al.  Impact of childhood abuse and neglect on substance abuse and psychological distress in adulthood. , 2007, Journal of traumatic stress.

[12]  James H. Johnson,et al.  Assessing the impact of life changes: development of the Life Experiences Survey. , 1978, Journal of consulting and clinical psychology.

[13]  P. Costa,et al.  Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R) and NEO-Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI) , 1992 .

[14]  K. Kendler,et al.  Childhood sexual abuse, stressful life events and risk for major depression in women , 2004, Psychological Medicine.

[15]  P. Schnurr,et al.  Research on posttraumatic stress disorder: epidemiology, pathophysiology, and assessment. , 2002, Journal of clinical psychology.

[16]  C. Nemeroff,et al.  The interaction of serotonin transporter gene polymorphisms and early adverse life events on vulnerability for major depression , 2006, Current psychiatry reports.

[17]  I. Gotlib,et al.  Adult attachment security and symptoms of depression: the mediating roles of dysfunctional attitudes and low self-esteem. , 1996, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[18]  A. Levendosky,et al.  Adolescent survivors of childhood sexual abuse: the mediating role of attachment style and coping in psychological and interpersonal functioning. , 1999, Child abuse & neglect.

[19]  R. Gershon,et al.  Work Stress in Aging Police Officers , 2002, Journal of occupational and environmental medicine.

[20]  Dieter Wagner,et al.  Predicting posttraumatic stress symptoms from pretraumatic risk factors: a 2-year prospective follow-up study in firefighters. , 2005, The American journal of psychiatry.

[21]  R. Shelton,et al.  Cellular mechanisms in the vulnerability to depression and response to antidepressants. , 2000, The Psychiatric clinics of North America.

[22]  Paul D Bliese,et al.  Childhood adversity and combat as predictors of depression and post-traumatic stress in deployed troops. , 2007, American journal of preventive medicine.

[23]  R. Nesse,et al.  Childhood adversity and vulnerability to mood and anxiety disorders , 1997, Depression and anxiety.

[24]  R. Bryant,et al.  Maladaptive Appraisals as a Risk Factor for Posttraumatic Stress , 2005, Psychological science.

[25]  R. Bryant,et al.  Maladaptive self-appraisals before trauma exposure predict posttraumatic stress disorder. , 2007, Journal of consulting and clinical psychology.

[26]  Christopher G. Davis,et al.  Childhood adversity and adult psychiatric disorder in the US National Comorbidity Survey , 1997, Psychological Medicine.

[27]  R. Janoff-Bulman.  Assumptive Worlds and the Stress of Traumatic Events: Applications of the Schema Construct , 1989 .

[28]  E Laukkanen,et al.  Alexithymia and depression: a prospective study of patients with major depressive disorder. , 2001, Psychosomatics.

[29]  A. Beck,et al.  Beck Depression Inventory–II , 2011 .

[30]  Z. Segal,et al.  Cognitive Vulnerability to Depression , 1998, Journal of Cognitive Psychotherapy.

[31]  R. de Raedt,et al.  Self-esteem reconsidered: unstable self-esteem outperforms level of self-esteem as vulnerability marker for depression. , 2007, Behaviour research and therapy.

[32]  M. Ingvar,et al.  Neuroendocrine, Cognitive and Structural Imaging Characteristics of Women on Longterm Sickleave with Job Stress–Induced Depression , 2006, Biological Psychiatry.

[33]  Michael C Neale,et al.  A longitudinal study of personality and major depression in a population-based sample of male twins , 2007, Psychological Medicine.

[34]  C. Kirschbaum,et al.  Work stress, socioeconomic status and neuroendocrine activation over the working day. , 2004, Social science & medicine.

[35]  D. Stewart,et al.  Major depressive episodes and work stress: results from a national population survey. , 2007, American journal of public health.

[36]  Hung-Chi Wu,et al.  A Survey of Quality of Life and Depression for Police Officers in Kaohsiung, Taiwan , 2006, Quality of Life Research.

[37]  Jochen Hardt,et al.  Validity of adult retrospective reports of adverse childhood experiences: review of the evidence. , 2004, Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines.

[38]  Lr Derogatis,et al.  SCL-90-R, Administration, Scoring, and Procedures Manual-II for the R(evised) Version and Other Instruments of the Psychopathology Rating Scale Series , 1983 .