The Effects of Occupational Stress on the Job Performance of Police Officers in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Stress is common and general among the people in the world. It is experienced by every person physically and mentally in their day-to-day life. Hence, Policing is widely considered to be one of the most stressful occupations, wherein organizational and operational stressors put law enforcement officer’s physical and mental health at risk. Occupational stress badly affects performance, and many studies revealed that the level of stress experienced differs with the type of job. Accordingly, this research paper demonstrates how Police Officers experienced occupational stress and its impact on their performance. This study is a mixed method study using quantitative data gathered from a questionnaire and qualitative data from five in-depth interviews. A sample of 110 police officers from other ranks was taken from the central province of Sri Lanka. Findings showed that lack of resources mainly influenced police performance. In contrast with previous empirical work, the findings demonstrate that operational issues and less career growth have an adverse influence on police performance. This study has drawn the linkage between organizational stressors, operational stressors and police performance of other rank officers in the Sri Lanka context. This research was based on the data of central province officers only is a limitation. Also, the findings are limited to the other ranking officers and therefore future research directions could be focused to the inspectorate officers, senior gazetted officers.