Judith Andersen Email & Phone Number

http://proresilience.orgIt is clear that high stress arousal is associated with judgment and decision-making during critical incidents. In policing, this translates to potential life or death consequences for officers and civilians.Our research lab has monitored the physiological and psychological stress responses of police and SWAT team officers during real-life and training scenarios. We have found that officer performance during critical incidents (as rated by expert SWAT trainers independent of our research) could be predicted from their physiological profiles (e.g., cortisol and cardiovascular reactivity).Based on these findings, our team of collaborators has developed an intervention (iPREP) that addresses the psychological and physiological arousal associated with high threat situations in order to improve use of force decision making. Implications of this short-term training include potential lifesaving actions for both officers and the civilians they interact with.The iPREP methodology is now being taught as standard police training at the Police University College of Finland, the institution responsible for training all the police officers in that nation. Currently, clinical trials of iPREP are being conducted with police recruits and patrol officers in urban southern Ontario, Canada, and the State of Illinois, Police Training Institute at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

Listed skills include Post Traumatic Stress, Critical Incident Stress Management, Stress Analysis, Interventions, and 13 others.

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  University Of California, Irvine

  Health/Medical Psychology