PECULIARITIES OF EMOTIONAL-VOLITIONAL SELF-REGULATION OF POLICE OFFICERS UNDER MARTIAL LAW

Abstract

The full-scale armed aggression against Ukraine has radically transformed the functional profile of the National Police. Today, a police officer is not only a law enforcement agent but also an integral part of the security and defense sector, participating in stabilization measures, evacuations, and combat operations. This shift demands a boundary level of self-regulation under permanent threats and multi-factor stress. Emotional-volitional regulation has become the primary guarantor of professional reliability—the ability to make balanced decisions amidst fatigue, anger, or fear.

The purpose of this article is to identify the psychological characteristics of law enforcement officers' emotional-volitional self-regulation during martial law. The study involved 62 police officers (3–8 years of service). A battery of methodologies was utilized: CERQ (cognitive regulation), EQI (emotional intelligence), GSE (self-efficacy), and SSPM (general self-regulation style).

The empirical results revealed a specific "executive-mobilizing" personality profile. The cognitive component is the most stable: the dominance of "Refocus on Planning" (16.4 points) and "Positive Reappraisal" (15.2 points) indicates well-established reframing mechanisms. Officers perceive danger as a professional challenge, which minimizes manifestations of catastrophizing. The emotional sphere is defined as dysharmonious. High self-motivation (14.2 points) is coupled with a critically low level of emotion management (7.4 points). This creates a risk of energy depletion: officers are proficient at "pressing the gas" but possess "weak brakes" regarding stress deactivation. The volitional link (self-efficacy—32.8 points) acts as a buffer, where the belief in one's own capability prevents systemic collapse through intense volitional effort.

The general style of self-regulation is based on hyper-mobilization. A deficit in the "Evaluation of Results" scale (5.4 points) indicates a decrease in criticality toward one's own internal states. Self-regulation operates on the principle of "task completion at any cost," where external efficiency is achieved by ignoring internal signals of exhaustion. This creates prerequisites for systemic burnout, necessitating the implementation of specialized emotional recovery programs.

References

 Bondarchuk, M. T. (2016). Self-regulation of police officers' mental states as a condition for their effective performance of official tasks. Pravo i Bezpeka [Law and Safety], (4), 115–120.

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