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Personality Profiles of Special Force Police Officers

Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology volume 27, pages 99–110 (2012)Cite this article

Abstract

The present study was aimed at investigating whether different personality profiles could be found among Italian police Special Force (SF) officers. Our hypothesis was that different personality profiles would be found, and that they would differ with respect to psychological and organizational functioning. This conjecture was tested on anonymously collected Big Five scores of all members of a 'Reparto Mobile' unit (n = 289) by means of a Two-Step cluster analysis. Two distinct personality profiles were found: two-thirds of participants showed a personality profile that was quite similar to the general population, with the exception of a higher self-reported emotional stability and self-deceptive enhancement, while the remaining third showed higher levels of any personality domain than both the other cluster and the general population. These officers also endorsed lower scores in measures of depression, anxiety, professional exhaustion, loss of empathy, and higher scores in a measure of organizational resilience, suggesting that they may represent the most suitable personnel for the delicate tasks their unit usually has to accomplish. In addition, self-deceptive enhancement emerged as a likely personality trait of police SF officers.

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Fig. 1

Notes

  1. According to Cohen (1988), effect sizes can be classified as negligible (|r| < .10), small (.10 < |r| < .30), moderate (.30 < |r| < .50) and large (|r| > .50)

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Acknowledgements

This study has been made possible by the positive cooperation of the Italian Police Force (Ministry of the Interior) that supported the data collection. In particular, the Authors wish to thank to Dr. P. Brasola, Dr. M. Filippetti, Dr. G. Arcidiacono, F. Cozzone, S. Grigoletto, R. Sericano and all the policemen assigned to the ‘VI Reparto Mobile’ of Genoa. They are also grateful to Mikaela McKellar for proofreading and to two anonymous reviewers whose comments greatly helped in improving the paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Police Health Service Department, Ministry of the Interior, Rome, Italy

    Sergio Garbarino & Giovanni Cuomo

  2. Department of Neuroscience, Ophthalmology and Genetics, University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy

    Sergio Garbarino

  3. Department of Educational Sciences, Psychology Unit, University of Genoa, Corso Podestà, 2, 16128, Genova, Italy

    Carlo Chiorri & Sara Piattino

  4. Institute of Occupational Medicine, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Rome, Italy

    Nicola Magnavita

Authors
  1. Sergio Garbarino
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  2. Carlo Chiorri
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  3. Nicola Magnavita
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  4. Sara Piattino
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  5. Giovanni Cuomo
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Carlo Chiorri.

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Sergio Garbarino and Carlo Chiorri contributed equally

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Garbarino, S., Chiorri, C., Magnavita, N. et al. Personality Profiles of Special Force Police Officers. J Police Crim Psych 27, 99–110 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11896-011-9099-6

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Keywords

  • Police
  • Big Five
  • Special forces
  • Personality profiles
  • Psychological functioning