The Relationships between Reduced Alcohol Use and Decreased Burnout following Mindfulness-Based Resilience Training in Law Enforcement Officers

Objective: This study is a secondary analysis of data collected in an earlier clinical trial of mindfulness-based resilience training (MBRT) (ClinicalTrials.gov registration number 02521454), where the MBRT condition demonstrated a significant reduction in self-reported burnout and trend-level reductions in alcohol use in law enforcement officers (LEOs). Given that MBRT is not designed to be a substance use intervention and does not contain explicit substance-related content, this study sought to clarify these findings by exploring whether improved burnout mediates reduced alcohol use. Method: Participants (n = 61) were sworn LEOs (89% male, 85% White, 8% Hispanic/Latinx) recruited from departments in a large urban metro area of the northwestern United States, and were randomized to either MBRT (n = 31) or no intervention control group (n = 30) during the trial. Results: MBRT group assignment predicted reduced burnout (b = 0.43, standard error [SE] = 0.14, p = 0.004), which subsequently predicted reduced alcohol use (b = 1.69, SE = 0.81, p = 0.045). Results suggest that reduced alcohol use was indirectly related to a reduction in burnout post-MBRT. Conclusion: Given that MBRT does not explicitly address substance use, these findings were interpreted to suggest that officers in the training acquired a new set of coping skills to deal with the operational and organizational stressors of police work.