Freiburg Personality Inventory for assessment of the police of icers

Background. Psychological and psychiatric work activity support of law enforcement of icers is a basic component for the ef icient functioning of the internal affairs institutions. Improvement of this work is impossible without increasing the effectiveness of the personnel psychological selection. Methods. Researchmethods included ”Freiburg Personality Inventory” (FPI) Option «B» and «Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory» – MMPI. The study group comprised of 158 respondents: 79,1% (n=125) weremen and 20,9% (n=33) women. To analyze the results obtained, we used the methods of descriptive statistics, frequency analysis, and Kendell rank correlation. Results. Particular attention should be paid to the fact, that it would be logical to expect the presence of correlations between FPI andMMPI scales, similar in their diagnostic orientation. But such correlations were found neither for themale or female gender (τ -b≤0,17;p≥0,06). This unexpected discovery, as well as the lack of systematic and gender-wide universality between the FPI and MMPI scores, are pointing to a rather serious content heterogeneity between these psychological tests. Conclusion. The results of the analysis do not provide an opportunity to recommend the wide usage of FPI quistionnaire in practical activities for the professional selection of law enforcement of icers.


Background
Psycho-psychiatric professional activities assessment is an integral part for the ef icient and vocational functioning of the Ukrainian law-enforcement system.It should be noted, that this system is under an impact of a long-term social crisis, the constant police of icers rotation and intensive expo-sure to various psycho-traumatic factors.In this terms, the timely detection of persons with an increased level of neuropsychological instability, a tendency to aggressive, brutal behavior becomes not only a task for mental disorders prevention but also become an important social task -not to allow the authority possession for the persons who have psychological problems.It can cause much more harm than good.
Continuous improvement of psychodiagnostic work is aimed for enhancement of identi ication not only persons, suffering from mental and behavioral disorders, but also police of icers with neuropsychiatric instability, tendency to aggression and other deviant forms of behavior.Such improvements are required by a numerous departmental documents, such as the "The program of mental disorders prevention in personnel division of the Internal Affairs of Ukraine", "The concept of development and improvement of medicalpsychological rehabilitation in the system of the Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs and a program of measures for its implementation", etc. Convincingly, it is impossible to carry out this work without expanding the range of experimental psychological techniques that could be used during police oficers' psychological and psychiatric examinations in the departmental institutions.
Thus, the purpose of this study was to analyze the practicability of the Freiburg Personality Questionnaire (FPI) usage during a medical and psychological police of icers examination, which undergo checkup by the Military Medical Commission or psychiatric examination in the departmental health care facilities of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.For this goal achievement, the following research activities have been performed: • Conducted a gender-speci ic experimental psychological examination of internal affairs of icers using the test (FPI).
• Carried out a gender-speci ic empirical and psychological police of icers survey using the Minnesota Multifactor Personal Questionnaire (MMPI), which has been utilized for a long time in the Ministry of Internal Affairs system and has established itself as a highly ef icient method for personality research.
• Drew a conclusion, based on the mathematicalstatistical analysis of the obtained results, and formulated a conclusion regarding the FPI test validity in the system of the Ukranian Ministry of Internal Affairs.

Methods and materials
The diagnostic test, evaluated in the course of this study, was the Freiburg Personality Questionnaire (FPI) -option "B".It was developed in 1963 by the scientists from the Hamburg University, including I. Fahrenberg, H. Zarg, R. G. Gampel and adapted in St. Petersburg University by O.O.Krylov and T.I.Ronginskaya [1].The questionnaire is intended to diagnose conditions and personality characteristics that are of particular importance for the process of social adaptation and behavioral regulation.The questionnaire allows to diagnose neurotic disorders in the: • emotional domain (scale III -the level of depression as a measure of decreased mood, subscale VІІІ -the level of shyness as an indicator of the presence/absence of anxiety, stiffness, uncertainty, XI scale -the level of emotional lability as a measure of frequent mood luctuations); • cognitive domain (scale V -the level of sociability as a measure of social activity); • behavioral domain (scale II -the level of spontaneous aggressiveness as a behavior characterized by impulsivity, a protective reaction to the others' actions and judgments; scale VІІ -the level of reactive aggressiveness as a behavior, characterized by an aggressive attitude towards the social environment and expressed desire for dominance; scale IV -level of irritability as an indicator of emotional response to others and/or situation); • somato-vegetative domain (scale I -the level of neuroticism as an indicator of disruption of the neurotic circle, to a greater extent asthenic type, with vegetative and possible psychosomatic disorders); • extraversion-introversion (scale X); • male-female characteristics (scale XII); • self-criticism (scale IX).
Cutoff FPI points are: 1 to 3 points -low, 4 to 6 points -medium, and 7 to 9 -high level.An important feature of the questionnaire is that the results of the IX scale, although important for assessing the overall validity of the responses, can still not be classi ied as indicators of the "authenticityunreliability" classical scale.
Taking into account that the validity study for the FPI was carried out by its authors by comparison with other "personal" methods, including the MMPI questionnaire, the second psychological test used in this study was the Minnesota Multi-Factor Personality Inventory (MMPI), which was developed in 1941 by Hathaway SR & McKinley JC.The latter scale after was repeatedly re ined and adapted by FB Berezin, MP Miroshnikov, and RB Rozanets in 1976 [2].Particularly important is the fact that MMPI has been successfully used for the last three decades as a compulsory psychodiagnostic methodology within the structure of military medical commissions of the Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Methods used for statistical analysis were descriptive statistics, frequency analysis, and Kendall's rank correlation [3].
The study group consisted of randomly selected from 158 employees of the Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs police departments at the age from 18 to 51 years, 79.1% of which (125 persons) were males, and 20.9% (33 persons) were females.All respondents were positively characterized by their superiors; they have never used psychiatric help; there weren't any information about deviations episodes from the generally accepted norms of behavior.

Results
According to occupational characteristics, the male gender consisted of persons, represented the largest number of professional groups (Table 1): patrol service police of icers, district inspectors, special forces ighters, and others.The female gender was composed of interrogators, employers of other non-operational services, commissioners, patrol police of icers and senior management staff.Thus, the study group was representative of both the gender and professional aspects.
Regarding the contingent that passed the survey, unfortunately, it was not possible to obtain objective anamnestic data on some manifestations of neuro-psychological instabil- ity during the service or at home.Such data absence made it impossible to allocate a particular "high-risk groups" for police of icers, and to justify speci ic ranges indicators of FPI scales that could be used in the future as a diagnostic markers.
According to the respondents' survey results, obtained with FPI, the following data were obtained.The mean scores on FPI scales indicate that both male and female gender representatives had low I, II, III, IV, VIII, and XI scores; medium VII and X scale scores; high V, VI, IX, and XII scale scores (Table 2).
Frequency analysis had fully con irmed described above results (Table 3).
Further analysis from FPI obtained data was carried out by calculating the Kendall coef icient τ -b (Table 4).These data were compared with those from the MMPI (these tests were performed simultaneously).
The positive correlation (τ -b≥0.139;p≤0.037) was found between the hypomania MMPI and FPI openness scores, as well as between social introversion and shyness scores.
When calculating the τ -b Kendall coef icient (Table 5) for the FPI and MMPI questionnaires for female gender, there were also found signi icant correlations, although the structure of these relationships was signi icantly different from that for male gender representatives.The statistically signi icant negative correlation bonds (τ -b≥-0,29; p≤0,03) occurred between following MMPI and FPI scales, respectively: • hypomania and femininity-masculinity; • depression and spontaneous aggression; • conversion hysteria and masculinity-femininity; • psychasthenia and impulsive aggression; • schizoid and masculinity-femininity; • social introversion and irritability.
As in men's gender, women showed a signi icant positive correlation between the scores on the MMPI hypomania and FPI openness scales (τ -b = 0.461; p <0.001).But, unlike men, they had positive correlations between the hypochondria and shyness and between the social introversion and sociability scores (τ -b≥0,26; p≤0,05).
Undoubtedly, the primary value of these results, both from the MMPI and FPI scales, lies in comprehensive performance evaluation of these techniques, assessment of their ability to give a general description of the individual's personality.However, it should be emphasized, that it would be logical to expect the correlation between FPI neuroticism and MMPI neurotic triad scores; FPI aggressiveness/irritability and MMPI psychopathy scales; FPI depression and MMPI depression scores; FPI masculinity-feminine and similar MMPI scales; FPI openness and MMPI social introversion scores.But such correlations were found neither within male nor female gender (τ -b≤0,17; p≥0,06).
This rather unexpected fact, as well as the lack of systematicity and gender versatility between MMPI and FPI, indicates a rather seriously substantive heterogeneity between these psychological tests (possibly because their authors were in several different theoretical positions).According to these data, the effectiveness of their mutual usage is rather doubtful, and, especially, FPI use as the replacement for MMPI.

Conclusion
For summarizing the study results, it should be noted that although the FPI scale has been used extensively for an extended period for practical and scienti ic purposes both in Ukraine and abroad, thus passing the "time testing", it doesn't give such a large set of data for the person's psychological portrait formation as MMPI does.
Most importantly, unlike MMPI, there is no reliable protection from dissimulation, simulation or aggravation tendencies that often occur in patients who are interested in social consequences psychological examination.To this category of patients, of course, can be include police of icers, who often are passing under psychological and psychiatric examinations for any reason.

Table 1 :
Distribution of male gender representatives by professional police category * N -here and thereafter is the absolute number of respondents.

Table 4 :
Results of Kendall coef icient τ -b calculation for the FPI and MMPI (male gender only).

Table 5 :
Results of calculating the Kendall coef icient τ -b from the FPI and MMPI (female gender only).