Heart Rate Variability in Response to Interpersonal Interaction Scenarios Among Law Enforcement Officers with Different Levels of Stress Adaptation

Relevance. High demands for stress resilience in law enforcement officers, combined with the inherently social nature of their work, necessitate the identification of factors related to social stress that disrupt professional performance.

Intention – identification of differences in spectral and temporal heart rate indicators when presenting situations of interpersonal interaction among law enforcement officers with different levels of adaptation to stress.

Methodology. The study is aimed at determining of heart rate variability when presenting situations of interpersonal interaction in 249 law enforcement officers with different levels of adaptation to stress. At the first stage, 3 groups with different levels of adaptation to stress were identified due to spectral characteristics of the heart rate when presenting stimuli simulating emergency situations; At the second stage, physiological parameters were evaluated in the selected groups during the presentation of interpersonal interaction situations, including neutral, joyful and 4 conflict situations: isolated and prolonged with humiliation or physical threat.

Results and discussion. It was revealed that in persons with a low level of adaptation to stress, the presentation of interpersonal interaction situations leads to high tension in the cardiovascular activity, a low compensatory increase in the activity of the segmental and central divisions of the autonomic nervous system, accompanied by a violation of habituation to the stressful content and a higher sensitivity to the stressful effects of prolonged conflict situations than isolated ones.

Conclusion. The results enhance understanding of the factors underlying behavioral disruptions in conflict situations among law enforcement officers with varying levels of stress adaptation. These findings can be utilized for assessing personality-professional competencies in this population. 

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