The Effectiveness of Mindfulness-Based Interventions for Police Officers’ Stress Reduction: a Systematic Review

The profession of a police officer is associated with high levels of stress, which can have harmful consequences for officers’ personal lives, the police organisation, and society. This systematic review aims to synthesise recent literature on the effectiveness of mindfulness-based intervention related to stress reduction (MBIs) in a sample of police officers. The search of relevant articles was applied in four databases (SpringerLink, Web of Science, Academic Search Ultimate (EBSCO), and PubMed), using the following inclusion criteria: (1) study involved police officers; (2) study used (quasi)experimental research design; (3) mindfulness-based stress reduction intervention was applied as the main intervention; and (4) study presented pre- and post-intervention measures and quantitative results of stress. The systematic review of eight articles included in the analysis revealed that MBIs were effective in reducing police officers’ stress and other stress-related outcomes (sleep problems, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), negative affect, burnout).