Occupational Stress and Burnout in Police Officers: Moderating Role of Attachment to Policy Making and Commitment to Public Interest

Abstract

In this research, focusing on police officers, the study investigated the connections between burnout, commitment to public interest, attachment to policy-making, and occupational stress. According to our hypothesis, there is a negative link between police officers' motivation for public service and occupational burnout, but a positive correlation between occupational stress and burnout. 126 police officers conveniently sampled from Police College Sihala and other police stations in Punjab, Pakistan, were the subjects of our cross-sectional research design. The study employed Pearson Product Moment Correlation to evaluate the data and determine the correlations between the variables. Additionally, this investigation used an Independent Sample t-test to examine gender differences and Hierarchical Regression Analysis to examine moderation. The research showed a negative association between dedication to the public interest and attachment to policy-making and occupational burnout and a positive correlation between occupational stress and burnout. Notably, the association between professional stress and burnout was significantly moderated by attachment to policy-making and dedication to the public interest. Additionally, the study found that while single police officers scored much better on public service motivation, they had significantly lower occupational burnout scores than married police officers. These conclusions have significant theoretical and practical ramifications, especially in light of the body of empirical research that has already been done. These findings suggest that psychological therapies targeting police officers' public service motive could be developed to combat occupational burnout.