Canadian Council on Learning | Conseil Canadien sur l'Apprentissage

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Using Simulation to Engage Police in Learning about Mental Illness: The Impact of Realism on the Learning Process

By Bill Goodman, Chris Hinton, Wendy Stanyon, Jay Tashiro

Background

Police officers are often the first responders to situations in the community involving mentally ill persons. Police contacts with individuals who have a mental illness have risen dramatically over the past few years, and police services are becoming increasingly aware of the need to provide officers with training beyond what is currently offered to new recruits in terms of mental illness and strategies for effectively engaging individuals who are presumed to have a mental illness.

Goal

The goal of this study was to evaluate the impact of using simulation to educate police officers about mental illness and how to respond effectively to common critical incidents involving mentally ill persons they encounter in the community using a mixed qualitative-quantitative design which included focus groups, surveys, and use of the Opinions about Mental Illness (OMI) scale.