Protective mechanisms of employees of internal affairs bodies with different levels of fatigue

The article with the involvement of empirical material examines the relationship of psychological protection with the fatigue of ATS employees, and also reveals differences in the dominant types of psychological protection mechanisms among ATS employees with different levels of fatigue. The respondents in the study were 171 police officers aged 25 to 37 years. The examined came advanced training on the basis of the St. Petersburg University of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia. A set of methods was used: the "Life Style Index Questionnaire" (developed by R. Plutchik and adapted by L. I. Wasserman, O. F. Eryshev, E. B. Klubova) and the questionnaire "Subjective Assessment of Personality Fatigue" (developed by S. V. Dukhnovsky, E. K. Shelepina. It has been established that an increase in fatigue is accompanied by the activation of protective mechanisms. It is shown that fatigue is a situation of official activity, which carries the threat of violation of personal stability, disorganization of labor (official) activity, behavior and psyche of the ATS employee as a whole, the experience of which involves the use of psychological protection mechanisms. It was revealed that at a low level of fatigue, the dominant psychological defense mechanisms are "rationalization" and "compensation." The leading defense mechanisms at the average level of fatigue are "projection" and "denial." Whereas at a high level of fatigue, "displacement" and "regression" begin to dominate.