A study of trauma and coping in police officers who investigate rape and child abuse in London

This thesis provides a portfolio of four pieces of original research which explores both trauma and coping in police officers who investigate rape and child abuse in London. This thesis first sought to understand what research existed in relation to secondary trauma and PTSD in UK policing, so a systematized literature review was conducted. This literature review consisted of two parts, with the initial literature review being completed in September 2019, and the second part, which was a continual review being completed in December 2023. The initial review identified twenty articles and the ongoing review identified a further twenty articles, giving forty articles in total that met the inclusion criteria. From the research, it was clear that trauma and coping in police officers was not understood, although this in part may have been due to the impact of culture which was prevalent in several articles. The second piece of research related to analysis of quantitative survey data, which identified that a subgroup of officers had potentially clinical levels of PTSD, anxiety, or depression. This research also identified that social support may moderate the effects of these conditions but due to the quantitative nature of the survey, further qualitative research was needed to try to understand how some officers are coping, and others were not. The third piece of research was a grounded theory study which was used to try to understand and develop a model of coping. Twenty-three interviews were conducted which highlighted that although some officers were affected by the traumatic nature of their work, the main ‘stressors’ related to organisational factors such as workload and lack of support from supervisors. Several risk and protective factors in relation to coping were identified including control, support, and having a sense of purpose. There was also the potential identification of ‘moral injury’ within these officers which was an unexpected finding. The forth piece of research is qualitative case study using thematic analysis to identify the key supportive qualities and behaviours of a supervisor working in rape investigation, and how these qualities and behaviours may support a supervisee to cope with their daily work. Using thematic analysis three key themes of ‘being supportive, trust and being competent’, were identified as well as ten subthemes which related to the importance of welfare; being present; being open and approachable; reputation; being humble; feeling valued; being passionate, awareness; being balanced and being trained.

The ‘golden’ thread which weaves this thesis together is the importance of support, whether that be social, peer, familial or from a supervisor, and its ability to help an officer to cope with the work they do. That may not be a surprising finding as the importance of social support in hierarchical organisations like policing is well known. However, this research is unique in that it has explored both quantitatively and qualitatively the importance of support in this particular ‘high risk’ group of UK police officers, which adds to existing policing literature. In addition, there were some significant findings such as the importance of having a sense of ‘purpose’, and the potential impact of ‘moral injury’, which will need further research. Purpose and moral injury appear to be significant to this group of officers although could potentially be relevant to the whole of policing. If these two findings are correct, then more research on both purpose and moral injury is needed to help us understand the impact, which is crucial as it is only when these are properly understood that officers who are struggling to cope can be effectively treated.