Customer Reviews

METTLE: Mental Toughness Training for Law Enforcement

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The job of a police officer is hard enough just dealing with crime and criminals. When you add the stress of critical incidents, officer-involved shootings,and post-traumatic stress symptoms, the job seems almost overwhelming. But Dr. Laurence Miller had offered a brave new approach to help officers deal with these kinds of events and demands. The key to survival according to "Mettle" is prevention - teaching officers in advance how to prepare themselves for unexpected events. The book also teaches what goes on in a person during stress from a physiological and psychological perspective. Behavioral principles are presented along with cognitive techniques. Real-life on the job kinds of challenges are discussed. This is a "must have" book for officers and administrators, and also for anyone who wants to understand officers and assist in their everyday functioning. As a police psychologist for 25 years, I highly recommend this new and important book by Dr. Miller.

I was very disappointed in this book because it really didn't talk about what an officer can do to bullet proof his mind. Instead it extensively covered what can happen when you get PTSD and on theories such as the pros and cons of different kinds of critical incident debriefings in a group setting.

I'll some up the one good piece of advice the book gave and save everyone some money. Visualize various critical incidents and your postive repsonse to them. That way you have practiced your repsonse physically (block that punch) and mentally (I'm down but I"m getting back up).

I have been teaching stress management in law enforcement for 15 years and this is the first book that truly deals with both sides of the equation: the research and the practical application. Clearly expressed, meticulously documented with the most current research, Dr. Miller provides an intelligent, practical system that will help any professional improve his or her ability to function physically and mentally under stress, especially if it is life threatening. Step by step, the individual is taught, as well as given the science behind, how to improve in such areas as self-efficacy, state of mind, arousal control, focus and concentration, and imagery. Each area includes suggestions and where appropriate practical exercises are provided for centering, relaxation, and developing various focus and attention levels. So often books promise practitioners help in dealing with stress and performance but disappoint by only restating the issues and giving general guidance. Whether you are an instructor or a practitioner, Dr. Miller's METTLE provides real science and cutting edge instruction that is sure to become a standard in both academic and training venues. This book should be required reading during training of police, fire, and emergency personnel.
Robert A. Fox, Professor, John Jay College of Criminal Justice

Doc Miller's new text provides a fresh and non-overwhelming take on the avenues of stress management in law enforcement using the process of METTLE: a research-based evaluation, analysis, and action process. The book engages the reader immediately and allows them to go where they need to in order to make determinations regarding current courses of action, department policies, and training implications. No one can get lost in this scientific translation that puts theory into action and gives the reader credible evidence and outcomes. A must-have for a cop's "library of survival"!

Mettle: Mental Toughness Training for Law Enforcement by Laurence Miller is an excellent resource on coping with the mental aspects of law enforcement that will help officers to be better prepared for critical incidents and stressful encounters. This book will provide you with tools to eliminate distractions, refocus your level of concentration and maintain emotional control during critical incidents.

The book is broken down into four sections:

Section 1: Extreme stress and mental toughness in law enforcement
Covers the basic principles of stress management and crisis intervention along with the essential components of the METTLE Model.

Section 2: Pre-incident mental toughness training
Covers arousal control, attention control, utilization of imagery, using though and language, and psychological survival training.

Section 3: Post-incident mental toughness reinforcement
Covers critical incidents and the stress response, group debriefing, and individual counseling

Section 4: Special applications of METTLE
Covers officer involved shootings and the aftermath

METTLE is a well written book that provides functional details along with appropriate and well defined definitions of terminology. Many different techniques are covered throughout the book providing you a multitude of options to find a technique that works well for you. This is a great resource for new officers to use and apply at the beginning of their career. Stress is an inevitable part of a law enforcement officers job and learning how to deal with it is a critical step in to living a balanced healthy life.

Reads more like assigned college reading for students rather than a true and practical book for law enforcement officers. Consists of many useless theories made up by researchers who have never been 10-8. Does nothing to develop "mental toughness". There are much better books out there written by people who have been on the front lines.

Dr. Miller's exceptionally well-written book deals with an important topic in the policing literature, and is equally relevant to the everyday work of police professionals. As someone who has written a number of criminal justice textbooks, I recommend METTLE to anyone looking for insights into police work and the practical realities of policing.

I will admit that I have not read the entire book, but the reason for this is that just about every paragraph has about three citations from other sources. It's like reading a 100 level English research paper. The author failed to capture my interest because everything presented in the text is obviously someone else's work. I thought that he was supposed to be an expert in his field, but apparently he cannot support his own work for more than two sentences without using someone else to reinforce his point.

If I had written any of my college essays with the same amount of parenthetical citations as the author has, my professors would have told me to put my own words into the paper and not just comment on other people's work. I feel I would be better off just reading the works of the many other people who are referenced in this book.

Dealing with the demand for clear thinking and good judgement in very difficult situations. Excellent for Law Officers.