Virtual reality meets the police badge: Qualitative findings on attention, decision-making, and action

Abstract

Police officers are expected to perform reliably under stress, yet stress responses are highly individual and can impair performance. As theoretical knowledge alone is insufficient to mitigate these effects, the understanding of acute psychophysiological stress reactions and associated attentional, decision-making and behavior is essential. This field study examines scenario-based police training in immersive virtual reality (iVR) as a method for controlled stress exposure. Based on a modification of the Integrated Model of Anxiety and Perceptual-Motor Performance (Nieuwenhuys and Oudejans, 2017), we hypothesized an increase of psychophysiological stress reactions and a decrease of attention, decision-making and action quality.Methods: N = 59 German police officers (Mage = 34.16 years; SD = 7.79; Mwork experience = 11.33 years; SD = 9.04) completed a 3-hour training session in iVR with three increasingly stressful scenarios. Semi-structured, brief qualitative interviews were conducted directly after each scenario to assess attention, decision-making, and action. The interview questions were shown on a poster. Then participants, standing apart, recorded their oral answers via a tablet.Results: A total of 1,116 data units were extracted. Most responses referenced attention (n = 562), followed by action (n = 291) and decision-making (n = 263). Officers focused primarily on situational features, involved parties, and human factors that evoke stress. Decisions were often described as intuitive, with little reference to prior training content.Conclusion: The qualitative data offer unfiltered insights into officers’ immediate experiences and enrich the theoretical model. Combined with police guidelines, the findings help evaluate whether officers relied on task-relevant or irrelevant information during high-stress decision-making.

Keywords: (Immersive) virtual reality, scenario-based training, stress

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1006094