Edinburgh Napier University

  The project will explore the 'psychological contract' of police officers. It would incorporate a mixed methods approach - initial online survey to new recruits at the Police College about their pre-work expectations an d motivations, together with another survey to police officers 2-3 years in about the extent to which their expectations are being met. We would then follow-up with qualitative interviews, potentially also including senior staff expectations of new recruits and the future police workforce too (maximum of 40 interviews in total). Any gaps in fulfilment of the psychological contract (i.e., imbalance between expectations and reality) would be the focus of recommendations and impact. This would link explicitly to the key themes within the funding call of building sustainable capability, capacity, resilience and wellbeing among police officers.