THE CORRECTIONAL OFFICER STOCKHOLM SYNDROME: MANAGEMENT IMPLICATIONS
Kevin
M. Gilmartin, Ph.D. and Russell M. Davis, M.A.
Published by: --National Institute of Corrections-- First
Annual Symposium on Now Generation Jails
In the
decades prior to World War II a work ethic existed which was
characterized bythe 'Average American Neighborhood.' The
husband worked, the wife was a housewife, all the neighbors knew
each other, the family belonged to a church and relatives lived down
the street or a few blocks away. The job was a place to earn money
to buy the house with the white picket fence or send the oldest son
to college. American society was less mobile and more stable. The
average worker was able to gain a sense of identity from belonging
to various social support groups.
Over
the past few decades the employment role has shifted importance to
the average American worker. The role of employment to meet the
purely economic needs of the worker has given way to an increased
importance of the work role to meet social and emotional needs.(1)
Asense of rootedness in the community has been lost for the
average American as neighborhoods disappear. People tend to
identify themselves more with the place and role of their employment
than the place or neighborhood of their residence. Management
philosophies have been expanded to meet the increased expectations
and needs of employees at the workplace.(2) Peter Drucker, in his
overview ofmanagement philosophies, reflects the shift by
stating, 'The shift in the structure and character of work has
created a demand that work produce more than purely economic
benefits. To make a living is no longer enough, work has also to
make a life."(3)
Management in the corrections field has not by any means been spared
the effects of the change in importance of the work place. Ifanything, correctional administrators must be more keenly
sensitive to the increased importance of what takes place at the
workplace and its emotion-behavioral consequences. These
emotional-behavioral consequences in manufacturing or other industry
are often a loss in productivity. In a corrections setting,
however, the consequences could often be a breach in security or a
life-threatening situation. Heavy emotional demands through stress
are placed daily on the corrections officer.
In
decades past, the management philosophy of 'keep your personal life
out of the Institution' has been employed. That philosophy was
based on the underlying premise that the correctional officer had a
personal life; another life away from the work place that had a
sense of identity, a sense of neighborhood where he/she could talk
to the person next door. The white picket fence street, where every
neighbor knew each other, and people went to work only to earn
money, is a thing of the past and doesn't exist in the life of many
members of the workforce.
The
average correctional officer today is reflective of today's American
society, a highly mobile society that for more than two decades has
been experiencing radical changes in the family structure. The
geographic mobility in American society has spread the extended
family of brothers, sisters, parents, aunts, and uncles over an
entire continent. As the sunbelt population explosion continues, a
correctional officer might find his/her support system of an
extended family spread over several thousand miles.
At the
same time geographic mobility is spreading the extended family,
divorce is breaking down the nuclear family. As the more
traditional support systems deteriorate, church membership
declines. The correctional officer who runs into a crisis at work
or at home, and could seek supportfrom family, neighbors, or
church members a decade ago, must now seek support from the only
viable support system; his/her place of work. What if correctional
managers are not sensitive to these significant changes in the
importance of the work place?
A
correctional officer, like any other person can be expected to
experience crisis in her/his life. Strong arguments can be made
that the very nature of the "pressure cooker" atmosphere that many
correctional officers work under makes them a higher than average
risk for stress related crisis.(6) If we define acrisis as:
"a subjective reaction to a stressful life experience, so affecting
the individual that her/his ability to cope is severely impaired",
we see ability to cope as the significant determinant. One's
ability to cope is directly related to the extent of emotional
support systems available to the individual. As the traditional
support systems break down and work becomes more important, we find
the correctional officer, who is experiencing a crisis, must decide
where to turn for support.
One of
the foundations of the New Generation Jail concept is
Maslow's hierarchy of needs. The physical design and management
systems for a direct supervision jail are designed to fulfill the
safety and security needs, as well as, basic biological needs of the
inmates. If we conceptualize the officer along Maslow's hierarchy
of needs ranging from basic biological survival to
self-actualization needs, we see the officer may enter the
institution with a higher number of unmet needs than did his
predecessors of a decade or two ago.(7)
Just
as successful management of a new generation jail is dependent on a
thorough understanding of the needs of the inmate, a successful
manager must consider that corrections officers also have needs.
The needs unmet by the disappearing traditional support systems will
be met at the workplace either by competent management, peer
camaraderie, or by manipulation of inmates.
The
future will see a dramatic increase in the application of the
podular/direct supervision jail concept. Each new facility will be
similar in some respects but at the same time, unique in design,
management, and staffing features. One characteristic of new
generation jails is constant; success is fully dependent on
enlightened management that fully understands human behavior and the
importance of meeting people's needs. Officer safety and integrity
can be potentially compromised by less than competent management
perception and practices.
As the
concrete and steel control of the older, linear intermittent
supervision institution gives way to the behavioral, interpersonal
relationship controls of the now generation facility, a specific
syndrome of security comprise potentially may develop.
In a
traditional facility the separation, by bars, of inmates and staff
allows each to maintain a degree of anonymity. The interpersonal
relationships between officer and inmate which are utilized in the
podular/direct supervision facilities permit emotional transference
between both parties to take place. This transference actually
decreases the likelihood an inmate will strike out and assault an
unknown officer. Now, unlike the past, the officer is a person with
a history of behavioral interaction with the inmate. The particular
officers pod management style has developed for him/her a track
record of interaction with the inmates. This officer is a real
person to the inmates not an unknown symbol of authority.
Consequently, many of the deviant behavior patterns of acting out
that typified older institutions have disappeared as behavioral
management of the new generation facility replaces the brutality and
steel controls of older institutions.
This
emotional transference, however, is a two way street. The inmate
also becomes a "real person" to the officer. This
behavioral-interpersonal style of interacting alleviates many of the
traditional problems of inmate-officer interaction. Indifference,
brutality and hostility give way to more rational behavior. A
cooperative joint effort of both inmate and officer to have a
supra-ordinate goal, running the pod, is the result.
Social
psychology has demonstrated the behavioral effects of dividing
people by bars with differential roles of officer and inmate. Each
participant responds to his individual needs most often at the
expense of the other. Hostility quickly increases and brutality may
surface. (8) The Zimbardo/Stanford studies demonstrate this
phenomenon. However, one even more basic social psychology
phenomenon of supra-ordinate goals has been demonstrated for
decades. If two previously antagonistic groups are placed in a
close proximity and are required to accomplish a similar task
cooperatively, the previously held differential roles and antagonism
break down. Joint cooperation takes place and a new singular role
identity forms. This has been clearly demonstrated for decades since
the classic Sheriff studies on supra-ordinate goals.(9) This
phenomenon has substantial relevance for the direct supervision
jail.
What
if management retains a management style of distant authoritarianism
and places these high-needs unfulfilled officers into correctional
settings with increased recognition of the Inmate as a
person? Since an officer in crisis may longer have an effective
support group outside the job, he/she will generally turn to his/her
peer officer for support; the peer officer theyused to walk
the floor with in a traditional facility, the peer officer they
interacted with as their paths crossed during rounds. However, in a
podular/direct supervision facility there are significant
differences that may have an adverse impact on support. The officer
may still see his/her "buddy" at briefings before shift and after
shift, and maybe even on a brief break if she/he gets off the pod.
However, eight to ten hours a day her/his interpersonal interaction
is with the inmate population; both locked behind the same doors,
both living in the same area, both feeling the same feelings of
isolation and frustration, if support services or management is not
responsive to their needs. The inmates hopefully do not become the
officer's peer group. But they can quickly become his/her reference
group for many of the day-to-day events that impact both the officer
and the inmate's life.
It
seems now that not only have the traditional support systems of
neighborhood, family, and church disappeared as a place for the
officer to turn to have his/her needs met, but their fellow officers
are locked away, unreachable in another pod. The two remaining
alternatives for having needs validated for the officer become first
line management or the inmates. Insensitive or incompetent
supervision, that alienates an officer and does not attempt to meet
whatever need is currently present, in effect pushes the officer
towards security violations with the inmates. When the officer
states "we", and he/she is referring to the inmates and themselves
on the pod, one has experienced semantic evidence of emotional
transference taking place.
This
transference is itself worth exploring. Why do hostages find their
emotional loyalties shifting from the rescuers to the hostage taker
as the period of confinement together increases? The answer is a
phenomenon known as "emotional transference". (10) What we observe
are people in close proximity, with the same supra-ordinate goals,
jointly cooperating and merging short term emotional and rational
belief systems. First identified in Stockholm, Sweden, in 1971
after a foiled bank robbery which generated into a hostage siege,
the phenomenon has been labeled the "Stockholm Syndrome". The
hostages shifted loyalties and began advocating for the hostage
takers. These processes of shifting loyalties have been described
in psychological literature for decades and have direct bearing in
correctional management techniques.
There
are several variables that force the development of the Stockholm
Syndrome. Finding oneself in an isolated situation with distance
from the individuals you previously perceived as meeting your needs,
appears central to all theoretical formulations of the syndrome. If
the isolated individual feels potential jeopardy or a risk from the
parties with whom or by whom he is being held, the syndrome
accelerates its development.
In the
correctional setting, one would be naive to believe that the
Stockholm Syndrome does not potentially take place between inmates
and a correctional officer, all of whom, have been confined in a
limited area for a long time. It would be equally naive, however,
to believe that the syndrome would manifest itself as quickly and as
drastically as it would in a police hostage siege situation. In the
correctional setting, one can expect the phenomenon to begin more at
the semantic level with the "we" referring to the officer himself
and inmates he/she manages.
From a
semantic level, one would predict that the shift and development in
the Stockholm Syndrome would proceed to a minor behavioral level
where the officer would begin engaging in a minor rule infraction
to make things easier for "his/her people". These minor rule
infractions would begin at the level of acts of omission and proceed
to acts of commission.
The
"minor" acts of omission would be demonstrated by a laxity in
enforcement of security measures. Searches for makeshift weapons and
other contraband would not remain intense as the interpersonal level
of comfort between officer and inmate grows. The belief "my people
would not do that" can falsely grow in naive correctional officers
who feel comfortable working in close proximity to a singular group
of inmates.
At the
level of acts of commission, these minor rule infractions, such as
bringing extra food, sugar, coffee, candy or other items onto the
pod, would not be perceived by the correctional officer as
contraband or rule violations, but rather as attempting to use
management philosophies to keep things running smoothly on the pod.
The
third stage of the syndrome development would be what Hacker in his
classic work on hostages calls the "poor devil" syndrome.(12) "It
is here where the victim-hostage begins feeling sorry for the "poor
devil". A correctional officer in close proximity to an inmate in
the jail setting who "feels sorry" for an inmate, who possibly will
receive a lengthy prison sentence or even a death sentence, may be
experiencing more thanjust casual reflection on a lengthy
prison term. The Stockholm Syndrome has developed to the extent
that hostages have thrown themselves in front of the hostage taker
only to be killed by rescuing police bullets intended for the
hostage-taker.(13) Equally as intense in a correctional setting,
the Stockholm Syndrome has accounted for loyal and competent
correctional officers actively conspiring to engage in escape
attempts.
The
present authors have extracted twelve cases of the Stockholm
syndrome over a three year period. All cases are from one
correctional setting where officers demonstrated emotional loyalties
to inmates ranging from intimate sexual contact with an inmate while
on duty to a successful conspiracy to assist in an escape from a
maximum security institution. The uniqueness of each of these cases
is that they are not merely instances of corruption for monetary
gain or compromise out of mare intimidation by inmates; genuine
ideological shift of loyalties to the inmates had taken place. In
the case studies, pre-employment psychological test evaluations were
available to be reviewed including Minnesota Multiphasic Personality
Inventories, psychologist's notes, and extensive background
information. No meaningful singular profile or diagnostic category
could be extracted from this data. Each officer had a satisfactory
to outstanding career prior to the acts of compromise which resulted
in termination, and, in some cases, criminal prosecution.
It
appears a lifestyle profile of the officers would be more
informative than formal testing in attempting to understand who
might be the high-risk officer to develop the Stockholm Syndrome.
Each officer had a career in law enforcement-corrections where
he/she highly identified with their position as officer. This
position was highly important to each individual and met many
emotional needs that were not completed in other aspects of their
lives. This exaggerated importance of the officer role led to an
over-identification with the job and a narrow, rigid view of the
people depending the officer interacted with and often the
perception of people appeared to be a function of whatever label was
placed on these people. This narrow, rigid, labeling view of people
lets the correctional officer perceive all inmates in one
distasteful category until one or a small group of inmates does not
fit into the officer’s pigeon holed perceptual set and exceptions
begin to be made.
The
over-identification with the role of officer was central, in each
case, to the compromised officer’s self-concept. These individuals,
who tended to over identify with their job as officers, were quite
popular with their follow officers, but all tended to be uninvolved
in meaningful emotional relationships in their private lives. The
only married officer of the group at the time of security compromise
was experiencing severe marital disruption.
In
each case, the officers were able to function adequately until
assigned a position in the facility which required close proximity
daily to either a single inmate or a small, specific group of
inmates. It appears that this daily close proximity to a single
inmate group led to the development of the "poor devil syndrome".
The officers began believing that the inmate was a "victim" and
began feeling sorry for him. One officer stated, 'I just wanted to
keep seeing him because I realized he might get the death sentence
and I left so bad about it.” The "high-risk" officer profile starts
as one who has a highly unfulfilling private life, and uses the
rigid identity of being an officer as an important veneer to an
incomplete self-concept.
The
syndrome seems to crystallize and become specific to one inmate when
this high riskofficer is placed in close proximity to an
inmate who is at risk, or who has already received, alengthy
prison term or possible death sentence. The high-risk inmate,
therefore, is also in many cases the high-publicity inmate who is in
prison typically for violent, and on many occasions, potentially
heinous crimes. This makes the formation and liaison between inmate
and correctional officer even more baffling to those who attempt to
understand it without sensitivity to the issues currently being
discussed. In each of the cases studied, the compromised officer
stated that publicity had a role in his/her actions. One officer
stated the inmate "wasn't anything like what the newspapers said he
was like." This attitude represents a form of cognitive dissonance
where the officer felt the inmate was "different from the rest of
the inmates" and rigid stereotyping broke down in favor of
preferential treatment.(14)
The
syndrome-profile can be seen to this point in a needs-unfulfilled
officer whose job many times is the only meaningful interaction in
his/her life. This officer comes into contact with a
high-publicity, usually highly manipulative inmate. The officer
begins spending excessive periods of time with a small group of
inmates and begins minor behavioral infractions on behalf of these
particular inmates.
The
cardinal feature of each case, however, that initiated the Stockholm
syndrome was a personal crisis in the officer's life immediately
prior to the time of compromise. These crises often went unnoticed
by coworkers or management at the institution. In several cases,
officers were punitively reprimanded by management for behavior
stemming from these crises. These actions only forced the officer
closer to the only viable support system available - the inmates.
This support system of inmates became the only place in each
officer's life where the term "we" had a genuine meaning.
This
behavioral model presents a scenario which has significant
implications to management in new generation jails. The very
principles and dynamics which make the new generation jail work also
support the development of the Stockholm Syndrome. Management
misperception and insensitivity may be the cardinal feature of the
Correctional Stockholm Syndrome in each case identified.
Taking an unfulfilled officer, who is currently experiencing a
personal crisis that either goes undetected or is even punitively
handled, and placing that officer in close proximity daily to a
small group of inmates, can be expected to foster the development of
the Stockholm Syndrome.
The
Federal system, as well as Contra Costa County, California, shared a
characteristic which is not shared by many of the newer direct
supervision jails. In both systems, an officer who was having
trouble functioning in a direct-supervision jail could transfer to
another assignment for a relief period or on a permanent basis. In
the Federal system, officers could transfer to other traditional
type institutions. In Contra Costa County the officers could
transfer to law enforcement duties in the field.
In
other new facilities, such as Ladmer County, Colorado, Multhnomah
County, Oregon, and Pima County, Arizona, the flexibility for
transfer is not available. The law enforcement and corrections
sections of these departments are separate job classifications with
separate career paths. Within the institutions, 70-90 percent of
the corrections officers work in direct-supervision pods and the
remainder in control rooms, escort, or other support services. The
ability to find an alternate assignment to increase the proximity
with other officers and minimize contact with inmates is extremely
limited.
The
result of these significant differences may have an adverse impact
on the application of direct supervision in facilities with similar
characteristics. The Correctional Officer Stockholm Syndrome should
by no means deter an agency from adopting the new generation jail
concept. When all aspects are considered, the new generation
concept is by far the best method of design and management of jails
today.
What,
then, can management do, and who are the high risk managers? The
first thing management must do if it attempts to develop a viable
program for preventing the development of the Correctional Officer
Stockholm Syndrome is to become introspective and not extrapunitive.
Management must accept responsibility that the solution to avoiding
the Stockholm Syndrome lies in proactive management strategies, not
punitive reactionary discipline against the officer, when clear
symptoms of the syndrome are identified. Aproactive
approach must address the central issues of the Stockholm Syndrome:
isolation, and vulnerability felt by the officer.(15) Management
cannot let an isolated correctional officer feel like his/her needs
are not being met. Whether these needs are for extra toilet
articles for his/her pod or for a sympathetic ear after a stressful
day. The officer must not be left to feel that "he/she is in the
same boat as the inmates." (l6)
Management must strive to develop group identifies and loyalties to
the organization as a whole. Strategies, such as requiring officers
to take meal breaks away from the pod or work unit and eating with
fellow officers, should not be seen as merely a break or benefit for
the officers but as genuine security measures that have preventive
value. Scheduling should be developed for breaks other than
mealtime where officers can relax with fellow officers and rekindle
peer officer camaraderie. Many managers might view this "down time"
as officers just "wasting time". These operationally-oriented
managers could prove extremely short sighted if the appreciation of
officers' camaraderie is missed. The result would be the "we"
syndrome, where officers might be more concerned about whether
"their pod" passes inspection, than if the departmental bowling team
was getting together.
The
proactive manager, in avoiding the Stockholm Syndrome, has
constructive debriefings after shifts so that officers are not
required to have makeshift debriefings at the local pub. Although
these "choir practices can have minimally constructive benefits to
the establishment of peer camaraderie, they canprove to be
fertile ground to the development of abusive drinking patterns that
can jeopardize home life stability and only further remove a
remaining support system from the officer's life.
Management, intaking a preventive-proactive approach, would
need to see that autocratic authoritarian communication patterns
must decrease in proportion to the degree of close proximity
inmate-officer contact. An autocratic style must give way to a
participatory bent in management. In order to avoid the 'loyalty
slippage" of the Stockholm Syndrome, the central issues of isolation
and distance from peer support felt by correctional officers would
need to be directly addressed. Many of the management philosophies
exposed by Peters and Waterman and their volume, In Search of
Excellence, would lend themselves directly to a
correctional institution's attempts to create a need fulfilling work
environment for the officer.(17)
Each
manager in a correctional facility must ask themselves: : 'If I'm
not meeting the needs of my officers and not listening to them, who
is?" The answer can be quite frightening. Correctional
officers cannot be made to feel that they are victims or left to
feel that they are in the same boat as the inmates. Correctional
management has lagged behind law enforcement management in the area
of utilizing the behavioral sciences or psychological services for
officers experiencing job related difficulties.(18) Large
correctional institutions are mandated by correctional standards to
provide services to inmates, yet officers are left in the
institution with minimal, if any, concern for job-related
difficulties affecting their lives. As the new generation of
correctional facilities takes over in the profession of corrections,
providing officer services and management sensitivities to officer's
needs must be viewed as genuine security concerns, not extraneous
fringe benefits.
The
new generation jail concept is rapidly gaining popularity and will
continue to flourish in the future. The podular/direct-supervision
concept has been endorsed by the American Correctional Association,
the American Institute of Architecture and National Institute of
Corrections.(19) It has been, and will continue to be, widely
accepted by the public when "packaged and sold", utilizing a
rational, reasonable approach.
There
is simply no room today for the autocratic authoritarian manager.
The correctional officer represents a vast untapped resource for
effectively managing inmates. If management is to be successful, it
must strive to be "enlightened management." Managers must become
thoroughly familiar with the psychological and sociological
principles of human behavior, which govern the actions of staff, as
well as inmates. The needs of staff, as well as, inmates must be
fulfilled. The corrections profession is evolving rapidly.
Management can guide this evolution and grow or be left in the
dust. The challenge is clear.
References:
1. Filipowicz, Christine, A., 'The Troubled
Employee: Whose Responsibility?' The Personnel Administrator,
1979, 24(6), pp. 17-23.
2. Peters, T.J. and Waterman, R.H., In Search of
Excellence, Harper and Row, New York, 1984.
3. Druckner, Peter F., Management Tasks,
Responsibilities, Practices, New York, Harper and Row, 1974.
4. United States Health, Education and Welfare
Department, Special Task Force, Work in America, Cambridge,
MIT Press, 1973, p. 83.
5. Kroes, William H., Society's Victim--The
Policeman, Charles Thomas Publisher, Springfield, 1972.
6. Bard, Morton, The Function of the Police in
Crisis Intervention and Conflict Management, U.S. Department of
Justice, Criminal Justice Associates, Inc., 1975.
7. Maslow, Abraham, Motivation and Personality,
2nd Ed., New York, Harper and Row, 1970.
B. Zimbardo, Phillip G., 'Pathology of
Imprisonment", Society, April 1972.
9. Sherif, Muzafer, Social Interaction:
Processes and Products, Chicago, Aldine, 1967.
10. Hassel, Conrad. 'The Hostage Situation*,
The Police Chief, September 1965.
11. Scholssberg, Harvey, Psycholgist with a
Gun, Coward, McCann, and F. Geoghegan, New York, 1971.
12. Hacker, Frederick, -Crusaders, Criminals,
and Crazies, Norton and Company, New York, 1976.
13. Lewinski, William J., An Alternative
Explanation for the Stockholm Syndrome, Unpublished Masters
Thesis, University of Arizona,
1980.
14. Festinger, Leon, A Theory of Cognitive
Dissonance, Evanston, Ill. Row. Peterson, and Company,
1957.
15. Ochberg, G., "The Victim of Terrorism:
Psychiatric Considerations", Terrorism, Vol. 1, No. 2, 1979,
pp. 147-168.
16. Schuler, Randall, S., "Effective Use of
Communication to Minimize Employee Stressm, The Personnel
Administrator, 1979, Vol. 24, No. 6, pp. 40-49.
