Citation

Chen PF, Wu L. BMC Public Health 2022; 22(1): e2275.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group - BMC)

DOI

10.1186/s12889-022-14758-6

PMID

36471297

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Police officers are a high-stress group with special job characteristics, and the Chinese police management system places particularly high demands on police officers. Whether the influence of job demands on officers' job burnout can be deduced to general stress response needs to be verified. Based on the JD-R model, the study aims to explore the impact of job demands on police stress response, whether job autonomy as a job resource has a moderating effect, and whether basic psychological needs mediate this effect.

METHODS: A total of 251 police officers in a district-level public security bureau of China, were surveyed using Chinese-language versions of the Job Demands Scale, the Stress Response Scale, the Job Autonomy Scale, and the Basic Psychological Needs Scale. The mediating effect of basic psychological needs and the moderating effect of job autonomy were tested by regression analysis and bootstrap test.

RESULTS: Job demands increase police officers' stress response, and job autonomy does not play a buffer role but enhances this impact, and job demands can partially reduce the police stress response through the satisfaction of basic psychological needs, that is, there is a masking effect of basic psychological needs.

CONCLUSIONS: Adjusting and optimizing the ratio of job demands and autonomy in police work to provide high guidance under high demands is of great value to reduce the negative stress responses among police officers.

Language: en

Keywords

Basic psychological needs; Job autonomy; Job demands; Police officers; Stress response