Webinar: Potentially morally injurious event exposure among Service Police and Non Service Police veterans

About this session

Moral injury has been found to have a significant impact on mental health and wellbeing across various occupational contexts. However, current literature has predominantly taken a reductionist approach that underestimates the complexity of morality and individual and contextual influences involved in moral injury. There is also limited research to date investigating moral injury within the UK armed forces context and specific military cohorts with potentially increased risk of exposure to potentially morally injurious events (PMIEs). This includes Service Police (SP) veterans who may be uniquely placed to experience PMIEs in their occupational role as both police officers and military personnel.

Shannon will present her research which investigated and compared the experience and impact of PMIE exposure between SP and Non-SP veterans. The complex exposure, manifestation, and management of associated moral dissonance experienced by these veteran groups will be discussed alongside wider implications for the conceptual advancement of moral injury and practical recommendations to improve the preparedness of military personnel and veterans for encountering PMIEs and managing associated moral dissonance.

Shannon’s presentation will conclude with recommendations for future research to adopt a value-centric and holistic approach to moral injury prevention and intervention.

Shannon's 45-minute presentation will be followed by 40 minutes of discussion with ICMI Director Dr Brian Powers and the audience.

About Shannon

Shannon has an academic background in psychology and forensic psychology and recently submitted her PhD in criminological research at Northumbria University on the above project. Shannon has five years of moral injury research experience to date and has co-authored various academic publications on moral injury exploring the impact of PMIEs across various UK veteran populations including those with co-occurring exposure to traumatic events, SP veterans, and LGBT+ veterans affected by the historic ‘gay ban’ within the military.

Join us

All welcome. To receive the Teams link, please register for the webinar via Eventbrite.