If surveyed, many people probably would state that police work mainly entails performing routine duties and answering questions for the public. However, the reality proves much more complex and varied.

Officers respond to the scenes of heinous crimes and bring order to chaos, restoring a sense of safety and security in the presence of violence or catastrophe. In this regard, police can be more than law enforcers in their communities.¹

For instance, officers serving in child exploitation units may experience symptoms of compassion fatigue, such as feeling emotionally overwhelmed or having a lack of concentration, as a result of providing abused children with long-term support during investigations.

In other cases, compassion fatigue may produce signs that an officer may not notice. For example, what officers experience in the line of duty regarding victims’ suffering may lead to emotional numbness or isolation. These “underground” emotions may reemerge in multiple problematic ways for officers’ health and well-being, including isolation from family, alcohol abuse, and difficulty controlling frustration and anger during interactions with others.

Eventually, compassion fatigue—often exacerbated by organizational stressors and a lack of appreciation from the community—may render officers more susceptible to severe mental health issues, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, and burnout.¹¹ Further, public criticism and perhaps unfair coverage of police work in the media may erode their sense of community support and professional pride. In turn, this impacts their feelings of well-being and places them at greater risk for harm when they encounter horrendous events and assist victims.

Additionally, failure to recover from traumatic stress after responding to calls for service involving violent and catastrophic incidents can place officers at higher risk for enduring not only behavioral symptoms but chronic physical health issues, such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and certain types of cancer.¹²

Gratification from Service

Police officers’ key role in critical incidents constitutes a protective factor in helping victims avoid poor long-term outcomes.¹³ These personnel may simultaneously play a crucial part in advancing victims’ recovery from traumatic experiences while more broadly contributing to the strengthening of relationships between police agencies and communities.¹⁴

In this context, compassion satisfaction refers to the gratification that officers derive from helping those who suffer.¹⁵ In one study, almost 31 percent of police officers reported high levels of compassion satisfaction.¹⁶ However, research also has shown that a considerable number do not appear to value the importance of their contributions.¹⁷ Therefore, while these officers still serve their communities, their inability to view their work as significant increases the likelihood that they will approach their duties perfunctorily.

Sometimes, officers may suppress their emotions or disengage while focusing their attention solely on investigative aspects of the incident. Perhaps they fail to appreciate the value of additional, trauma-informed approaches that may prove critically helpful to victims and witnesses and strengthen officers’ contributions to the investigation itself.

Research has indicated that officers and other frontline professionals who experience compassion satisfaction feel a greater sense of success and increased motivation because they can appreciate the value that their services add to the community and the lives of individuals.¹⁸ In addition, other studies have concluded that police officers with high levels of compassion satisfaction tend to show greater job performance, more commitment to their duties, and higher levels of self-perceived well-being.¹⁹

Perhaps unsurprisingly, research has revealed that compassion satisfaction is negatively associated with compassion fatigue—that is, an increase in one appears to correlate with a decrease in the other.²⁰ Possibly, compassion fatigue symptoms (e.g., feeling overwhelmed, hypervigilant, irritable) may preclude officers from experiencing compassion satisfaction.

Although this topic requires more investigation, it seems clear that officers with high levels of compassion satisfaction can appreciate the importance of their services despite exposure to overwhelming experiences and care for trauma victims. In addition, the negative association between compassion fatigue and compassion satisfaction indicates that using various techniques to strengthen compassion satisfaction can mitigate or entirely neutralize the virulent experience of compassion fatigue.

Recommendations and Implications

The authors recommend several sources of help in preventing or combating compassion fatigue’s impact on police officers’ health, well-being, and occupational performance.

Self-Care

Researchers have discussed and identified various self-care techniques that officers can use to help deal with compassion fatigue.²¹ As such, clinical practitioners could teach officers certain practical and easily applied measures for mitigating compassion fatigue’s effects.

These techniques also could become part of early career training for police cadets and new officers. Equipping new officers in this manner will help them avoid compassion fatigue’s deleterious effects on their future health and well-being. Moreover, because compassion fatigue appears positively associated with years of service, such methods would benefit veteran officers as well.

Although beyond the scope of this article, the authors note a number of effective techniques, including emotional regulation, controlled breathing, mindfulness, progressive muscle relaxation, biofeedback, gratitude exercises, journaling, and identifying and changing problematic thinking.²² To this end, clinical practitioners can collaborate with law enforcement trainers, union representatives, and high-ranking administrative staff to incorporate self-care strategies into police training to support officers in managing compassion fatigue.

Clinical Practitioners

Clinicians familiar with policing can play a vital role in helping officers improve their levels of compassion satisfaction. One way is to partner with upper-level administrators to develop programs that identify and celebrate the successes of the department’s officers.

For instance, briefing or debriefing sessions often focus primarily on facts and any issues that may have emerged during the previous shift. However, clinical practitioners, as part of ongoing partnerships and based on their training and familiarity with law enforcement, could attend these meetings and work with officers and their supervisors to identify and focus on positive incidents that occurred, such as achievements, moments of gratitude, and pleasant social interactions.

Because police officers appear to view these types of acts as routine aspects of their work (e.g., helping an elder cross the street, appreciating a civilian’s gesture to thank them), they may not take the time to reflect upon and feel grateful for the services they provide for their communities.

Additionally, partnerships between police officers and clinical practitioners have proven successful in the context of treatment and referral of crime victims. For example, one of the authors has developed partnership policy programs between clinical practitioners and officers from a local police department to improve the quality of responses to child abuse and domestic violence calls.²³ Similar partnerships between police officers and clinicians may be developed to support officers’ handling of their own police-related stress and trauma.

Administrators

High-ranking administrators can promote a focus on compassion satisfaction by inviting supervisory police officers to report any successes or positive interactions involving their officers to command staff and communicate these more broadly to the department. This approach would give officers the opportunity to share the value of their work with their supervisors and peers throughout the organization. It also would help them to appreciate their accomplishments—even the minor ones—while receiving the acknowledgement and support of the command structure, which, in turn, would establish an important departmental tone and set of values.

Community Groups

Because community clubs and organizations often form partnerships with local police departments, they can help foster compassion satisfaction by sharing their stories of officers’ accomplishments and expressing their appreciation of them. This feedback can help officers gain a grounded perspective of how their work plays a vital role in maintaining peace and order within the community. The New York, New York, Police Department (NYPD) has one such community participation program.²⁴

Police Organizations

Police organizations should put emphasis on the value of increased training for law enforcement professionals related to dealing with children and families impacted by traumatizing events.²⁵ A toolkit developed by Dr. Steven Marans and his team at the Yale University School of Medicine, Child Study Center, offers an exemplary and tangible way of increasing police knowledge and enhancing responses to children and families exposed to violence and other tragic incidents. Thus, it helps officers achieve greater confidence, a sense of effectiveness, and professional satisfaction.²⁶

Conclusion

The issue of compassion fatigue, which affects a significant number of officers, has multiple implications for police personnel. Thus, it demands the attention of law enforcement administrators, clinical practitioners, and policy makers.

Researchers have suggested that education, self-care training, and workplace policies can help foster compassion satisfaction while significantly decreasing or eliminating compassion fatigue symptoms.²⁷ Further study of police compassion fatigue is imperative because the findings will support the development of evidence-based training curricula and workplace policy programs that will promote compassion satisfaction and prevent or treat compassion fatigue among police officers. The development of such programs would yield results that will benefit officers, their families, and the community.