Getting to the source: how inmates and other staff contribute to correctional officer stress

Abstract

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study was to determine whether inmate-related stressors and lack of support from other staff correlated with concurrent physical and psychological symptoms of dysphoria in a large group of correctional officers. It was hypothesized that while inmate-related stressors and weak staff support would correlate with dysphoric symptoms in correctional officers, staff-related stressors would correlate significantly better with correctional officer distress than inmate-related stressors. A sample of 1,083 (773 males, 310 females) correctional officers from two different U.S. state correctional systems (Massachusetts, Texas) served as participants in this study. As predicted, weak staff support was a significantly stronger correlate of correctional officer stress than inmate-related stressors, after controlling for age, sex, race, research site, years of experience, institutional security level, degree of contact with inmates, and non-work sources of stress. The effect was particularly pronounced when dysphoric symptoms were correlated with weak perceived support from prison officials. These findings suggest that lack of support from other staff may create more stress for correctional line staff than interactions with inmates.