This study compared stress levels between law enforcement officers and the civilian population as measured by systolic blood pressure, the State-Trait Personality Inventory, and the Anger Reaction Scale. The relationship between systolic blood pressure and the self report instruments was also investigated. Thirty Deputy Sheriffs from the street patrol division of the Sheriff's Department served as the law enforcement group and 20 underwriters for the Hartford Insurance Company were the civilian or control group. the Deputy Sheriffs had significantly higher average systolic blood pressure than the Hartford employees with the effects of covariates removed. However, the Hartford employees scored significantly higher on anger--in F(1,45)=12.37, p < .005, anger-expression F(1,45=8.84, p < .005, state-anxiety F(1,46)=17.98, p < .001, trait-anxiety F(1,46)=22.77, p < .001, and trait-anger F(1,46)=13.44, p=.001, than the deputies. For the Hartford group, the relationship between systolic blood pressure and the self report instruments was consistent with previous research which has found a positive correlation between anger-in and systolic blood pressure. However, there was a negative relationship between the self-report scales and systolic blood pressure for the deputies which is inconsistent with previous research. These results suggest that the Sheriffs may be repressing some of these unpleasant emotions.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:rtd-5849 |
| Date | 01 January 1986 |
| Creators | Daniel, Susan K. |
| Publisher | STARS |
| Source Sets | University of Central Florida |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Retrospective Theses and Dissertations |
| Rights | Public Domain |
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