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PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to report on a systematic review that examined police social work and social service collaboration strategies implemented to address social problems.Design/methodology/approachA systematic review was conducted to identify the components of police social work and social service collaboration strategies. A total of 11 databases were searched. The inclusion criteria centered on the social problem, focus population, service providers, collaboration components and geographic location. Any methodological approach was included provided that a collaboration between police and social service providers focused on addressing a social problem was implemented and described.FindingsThe database searches identified 3,065 hits. After first eliminating duplicate titles, then reviewing and eliminating titles and abstracts that did not met the inclusion criteria, 119 full-text studies were reviewed. Among the 81 studies included in the systematic review, 83 implemented collaborations were found. The most collaborations were implemented in the USA, whereas only one implemented collaboration was found among the majority of the countries. Interpersonal violence was the most frequent social problem addressed by the collaborations followed by mental illness, crime, juvenile delinquency, and alcohol and substance use and abuse. Interventions were predominantly delivered by social workers who provided referrals and collaboration with social service agencies that assisted adults.Practical implicationsGiven that police officers are first responders to a wide range of social problems, investigating and disseminating information about the characteristics of police social service collaboration strategies is an important endeavor. Whereas investigating the effectiveness of collaborations was not the aim of this review, several practical implications can be derived from the findings. These findings show the types of social problems, partners and tasks that comprise the collaborations. The present findings suggest that law enforcement agencies do not have accessible name brand social work and social service collaboration models that can be replicated. The majority of the collaborations found appear to be unique models implemented between law enforcement and social service agencies. More outcome studies are needed that investigate whether the social problem has improved among citizens that received services from the collaboration.Originality/valueThis paper is the first systematic review focused on police social work and social service collaboration strategies implemented to address social problems.

This article describes the results of a systematic review examining police shootings of unarmed African American males. Each source was evaluated by two reviewers and coded based on topic relevance and inclusion criteria. Because of the weak external validity found among the experimental studies, the authors made a substantive decision not to synthesize studies in a meta-analysis. Social work practice implications are gleaned from secondary data obtained from coroner, medical examiner, toxicology, police reports, and the experimental studies included in the systematic review. Individual, community, and police departmental policy factors were most often reported to explain such shootings when excluding sources that examined armed African American males. Implications for micro and macro–social work practice are summarized as individual, community, and police departmental policy factors.

The objectives of this systematic review were to identify, retrieve, evaluate and synthesize the available evidence regarding outcomes of stress management interventions provided to veteran police officers and recruits. Included studies required a population consisting of veteran police officers, police recruits, and/or civilian (non‐sworn) police personnel; a randomized controlled trial (RCT), random assignment to conditions, or quasi‐experimental designs that included a control group; a psychosocial or other type of stress management intervention; quantitative outcomes although studies that utilized qualitative methods (focus groups, interviews) were included as long as these studies focus on the interventions examined in the RCT studies; and published and non‐published studies conducted in any geographic location. The results of the present review indicate that stress management interventions had no significant effect on psychological, behavioral or physiological outcomes. Whereas stress can contribute to negative psychological, behavioral and physiological outcomes the 12 primary studies examined psychological stress outcomes. Only three studies examined behavioral outcomes, and two examined physiological outcomes. Near null effects were found for psychological, behavioral, and physiological outcomes. Moderator analyses, although difficult and exploratory with so few studies, also failed to find any meaningful differences across the studies. These results do not provide evidence to support the efficacy of stress management interventions for police officers or recruits. Given the weakness of the research designs, we can neither claim that these programs are effective or ineffective. More rigorous studies are needed that evaluate the efficacy of stress management interventions among police officers and recruits. Abstract BACKGROUND Law enforcement organizations began to take notice of officer stress during the late 1970s. Stress has been found to not only affect the officers' job performance, but their personal lives and relationships as well. Because police officers are first responders to potentially stressful situations, their ability to successfully manage stress is critical not only to their own mental health but to the safety of society as a whole. Research has found that police officers who have difficulties coping with stress exhibit maladaptive behavior and personality traits such as aloofness, authoritarianism, cynicism, depersonalization, emotional detachment, suspiciousness, and excessive use of alcohol. High levels of stress can lead to serious physiological (headaches, stomachaches, backaches, ulcers, heart attacks) and psychological (anxiety, depression, flashbacks, and panic attacks) symptoms. Stress among police officers has also been connected to police misconduct and can also have a negative effect on the law enforcement organization due to lawsuits resulting from officers' performance. Other organizational effects include impaired officer performance, lower productivity, poor morale, poor public relations, labor‐management problems, tardiness and missed work, and officer turnover. Law enforcement organizations provide a wide variety of stress management interventions aimed at ameliorating officer stress. OBJECTIVES The objectives of this systematic review were to identify, retrieve, evaluate and synthesize the available evidence regarding outcomes of stress management interventions provided to veteran police officers and recruits. The review question is: What are the effects of officer stress management interventions on stress outcomes? SEARCH STRATEGY A variety of search methods were used to identify studies. These methods included: (1) searching electronic databases; (2) handsearching relevant journals, books, and conference proceedings; (3) searching Internet websites; (4) visually scanning reference lists from relevant studies; (5) contacting organizations and authors who have knowledge of police stress management and development program evaluations; and (6) citation searching. SELECTION CRITERIA The criteria for inclusion of retrieved studies focused on population characteristics and sampling strategies, interventions, study methods and designs, data analysis and outcome results. Included studies required a population consisting of veteran police officers, police recruits, and/or civilian (non‐sworn) police personnel; a randomized controlled trial (RCT), random assignment to conditions, or quasi‐experimental designs that included a control group; a psychosocial or other type of stress management intervention; quantitative outcomes although studies that utilized qualitative methods (focus groups, interviews) were included as long as these studies focus on the interventions examined in the RCT studies; and published and non‐published studies conducted in any geographic location. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS The meta‐analysis was performed using the computer software program Comprehensive Meta‐Analysis Version 2.2.050 (Borenstein et al. 2009a). For studies reporting multiple outcomes and time points these were not treated as independent. Effect sizes were separated out by outcome type (psychological, behavioral and physiological) and analyzed separately for different outcomes types. Among studies that contained multiple outcomes, the outcomes were averaged. Effect sizes were not averaged across different outcome types. Most often effect sizes were calculated using reported means, standard deviations and sample sizes, although some effect sizes were calculated using reported Cohen's d and t‐test results. RESULTS The results of the present review indicate that stress management interventions had no significant effect on psychological, behavioral or physiological outcomes. Whereas stress can contribute to negative psychological, behavioral and physiological outcomes the 12 primary studies examined psychological stress outcomes. Only three studies examined behavioral outcomes, and two examined physiological outcomes. Near null effects were found for psychological, behavioral, and physiological outcomes. Moderator analyses, although difficult and exploratory with so few studies, also failed to find any meaningful differences across the studies. These results do not provide evidence to support the efficacy of stress management interventions for police officers or recruits. Given the weakness of the research designs, we can neither claim that these programs are effective or ineffective. CONCLUSIONS More rigorous studies are needed that evaluate the efficacy of stress management interventions among police officers and recruits. Several recommendations are proposed for future research. First, police organizations should conduct evaluation research of their current stress management interventions that includes random assignment. Second, stress management interventions for police officers and recruits should focus on specific types of stress (i.e., organizational or personal). The type of stress that is the focus of the intervention should be described in studies. Finally, more qualitative data are needed to contextualize participants' experiences with the intervention.

Changes in the Hunter College School of Social Work (HCSSW) Library’s holdings have matched the contemporaneous changes in the field of social work for which it collects. While most schools of social work in the USA, including the program at Hunter, continue to emphasize agency‐based social work practice, the HCSSW Library’s collection indicates that the current curriculum is actually putting more importance on individual psychological problems like depression and eating disorders. This trend toward more private practice psychotherapeutic work has been decried in the field, but the HCSSW Library collection seems to indicate that schools teaching future professionals are complicit in this trend. This, in turn, suggests that an academic library’s collection can often anticipate changes in a field of study before it is widely acknowledged among the faculty who are experts in the field being collected.