{"id":6572,"date":"2018-04-13T09:18:48","date_gmt":"2018-04-13T13:18:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/?p=6572"},"modified":"2018-04-16T13:17:21","modified_gmt":"2018-04-16T17:17:21","slug":"a-mindful-approach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/2018\/04\/13\/a-mindful-approach\/","title":{"rendered":"A Mindful Approach"},"content":{"rendered":"

Counselor Educator Brings Federal-level Training to Statesboro-Bulloch County Law Enforcement<\/em><\/h2>\n
\"a
Apprehending Stress: Richard Cleveland, Ph.D. (pictured on left) explaining the process of the training and wrist sensor technology with Captain Todd Masburn, Senior POST Instructor for the Bulloch County Sheriff\u2019s Office.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>While completing his undergraduate degree, counselor education professor Richard Cleveland, Ph.D., worked as a campus officer to help pay for school. \u201cI remember one of my first calls was a response of an elderly woman who fell down a flight of stairs and cracked her head open,\u201d he recalled. Cleveland said he was the first one on the scene, and his first response was fear. He froze at the sight.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt felt like forever, but looking back on police logs it was maybe a minute,\u201d he explained. \u201cBut for me, I felt so ashamed\u2014like I wasted so much time.\u201d Thinking back, Cleveland used this experience to explain how the body reacts in stressful situations.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe more stressed we get, the more we lose fine motor skills,\u201d he explained. \u201cFiring a weapon safely and effectively requires a large amount of cognitive processing and fine motor skills.\u201d<\/p>\n

That is part of the basis of Cleveland\u2019s new research. Receiving a seed grant from the College of Education (COE), Cleveland\u2019s pilot project, \u201cMindfulness-Based Tactical Instruction,\u201d explores how mindfulness practices or attention to thoughts and feelings will help officers mitigate the psychological effects of high stress when engaged in tactical situations. The project is a collaboration with the College\u2019s counselor education program, Georgia Southern University\u2019s Public Safety Department, Statesboro Police Department, Bulloch County Sheriff\u2019s Office, and the United States Pentagon Force Protection Agency. COE\u2019s Jonathan Hilpert, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Curriculum, Foundations and Reading is contributing his expertise in data analysis.<\/p>\n

Currently participating in a national work group, Hilpert is looking at stress levels for students taking exams. This, Cleveland explained, is a great link to the mindfulness research he is completing, as they can use similar strategies and methodologies for students in high-stress situations that they are using for the tactical practices for the officers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are already thinking about how in the future to apply this to Georgia Southern students and, specifically, counselor education students as they are navigating intense counseling sessions and choosing their words and reactions,\u201d said Cleveland.<\/p>\n

The Training: How Does It Work?<\/h2>\n

The training includes pre- and post-tests with officers wearing a wrist sensor that takes several measurements including heart rate and electrodermal activity (EDA). EDA measures the involuntary changes in the electrical properties of the skin such as sweat glands, which are thought to be an effective measure of stress in the body.<\/p>\n

The Pentagon Force Protection Agency\u2019s involvement initially began through informal conversation about helping trainees manage stress.<\/p>\n

The Agency\u2019s interest grew, however, as Cleveland\u2019s project developed to include data looking at stress levels from EDA measurements, as currently federal trainings monitor stress primarily with the use of heart rate.<\/p>\n

Tests are conducted in the Statesboro Police Department\u2019s simulator, a fully-interactive, computer-based training that can change based on participants\u2019 reactions. Cleveland and Hilpert look for data such as proper response to a situation; how long it takes for the officer to draw their weapon; length of time to pull the trigger; how many shots are fired; whether the target is hit and how many times; and stress level throughout the exercise. This provides a baseline for officers prior to entering training.<\/p>\n

After the baseline data, officers receive one or a combination of trainings including standard department training, stress inoculation and\/or mindfulness training.<\/p>\n

Stress inoculation includes a safety briefing and five-day field-range experience that expose officers to drills and live-fire scenarios that place stress on the mind and body.<\/p>\n

\u201cFiring a weapon safely and effectively requires a large amount of cognitive processing and fine motor skills.\u201d<\/strong><\/em>
\n\u2014Richard Cleveland<\/strong><\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s exercise after exercise to help them draw their weapon out, discharge that weapon safely and effectively so that when they arrive at that moment they decide to use lethal force, however long it takes them to wade through the stress, then they can engage,\u201d said Cleveland. \u201cThat\u2019s the stress inoculation training.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is yelling, movement and introductions of safety malfunctions such as\u00a0 misfires or jammed guns. Even though officers train for these situations, they often do not know how they will react until such incidents occur. Ensuring that they can react properly over and over again is vital.<\/p>\n

\u201cThink about the neurons in the brain,\u201d explained Cleveland. \u201cWhat gets fired, gets wired. Repetition trains the brain.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mindfulness training has officers practicing present moment awareness and how to attend to all the incoming stimuli they face in a high-stress situation.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy hope,\u201d Cleveland said, \u201cis to give them tools to navigate that stressful environment, to use the best skills that they have for making decisions on safety for themselves and for everyone that they are serving and protecting. If they do have to use lethal force, that decision has been arrived at through all their cognitive abilities available rather than just a knee-jerk reaction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cleveland says this training cannot teach officers how to avoid stress. No one can. It is about fielding that stress and returning to a state in which you can use all cognitive and fine motor abilities to make a decision and react.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t help the stress magically go away,\u201d he said. \u201cThey can\u2019t cheat the body. The hope is that the skills help them get back to functioning faster. It\u2019s more streamlined because they know what to expect.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mindfulness training includes combat breathing which focuses on regular, measured breathing as oxygen deprivation and lack of blood flow can cause negative physical effects on the body. Other examples of mindfulness skills include present moment and non-judgmental awareness whereby officers can attend to a situation without jumping to conclusions or using preconceived notions or responses.<\/p>\n

After officers participate in training, they complete a post-test in the simulator to compare with the original scores of their pre-test data. The pilot has 10 participants from the partnering law enforcement agencies that are training with Cleveland, Hilpert and trainers from the Pentagon Force Protection Agency who complete trainings similar to these annually for federal agents.<\/p>\n

Materials from the training, including curriculum and protocols, will be shared so that local law enforcement can continue this type of training when possible. \u201cI want to see that the project can serve as a resource,\u201d Cleveland said. \u201cTo be able to bring this type of training down to local, rural law enforcement is very rare.\u201d<\/p>\n

Training for Cleveland\u2019s pilot project is ongoing during spring 2018.<\/p>\n

\u2014\u00a0Cinnamon Dowd<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Counselor Educator Brings Federal-level Training to Statesboro-Bulloch County Law Enforcement \u00a0While completing his undergraduate degree, counselor education professor Richard Cleveland, Ph.D., worked as a campus officer to help pay for school. \u201cI remember one of my first calls was a response of an elderly woman who fell down a flight of stairs and cracked her […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":6573,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[56],"class_list":["post-6572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","tag-spring-2018"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6572\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ww2.georgiasouthern.edu\/news\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}