Police officers are at increased risk of PTSD, a condition that can significantly disrupt daily life due to flashbacks, avoidance, negative mood, and problems with attention and working memory. Many officers continue to experience long-term symptoms despite treatment. This dissertation investigates whether dogs—both assistance dogs and regular companion dogs—can help improve well-being and cognitive functioning.
Interviews show that both types of dogs provide emotional support. Service dogs do this more consistently and purposefully thanks to their training, while companion dogs offer an accessible alternative when specialized assistance is not available. Experimental studies show that the presence of a dog improves working memory and can reduce hypervigilance: officers perform better on memory tasks and exhibit more stable attention when their dog is present. In addition, a training program for officers with PTSD and their companion dogs was evaluated. The training proved feasible and led to improvements in well-being, self-regulation, and supportive dog behavior. Together, the studies show that dogs are an accessible, effective source of emotional and cognitive support for police officers with PTSD.
Charlotte Lina Witjes-Roelofs (1996, Amsterdam) is a neurobiologist with expertise in EEG. During her bachelor’s degree in Medical Biology and her research master’s in Neurobiology at Radboud University, she completed several internships during which she performed EEG measurements and, among other things, contributed to a publication on individual alpha frequency and rTMS outcomes in depression. She then worked as a research assistant at the Police Academy, where she collected EEG data from police officers with PTSD. Her subsequent doctoral research, a collaboration between Radboud University and the Police Academy, focused on the added value of assistance dogs for police officers with trauma. Charlotte is currently a researcher at the Police Academy, where she conducts practice-oriented research within the police field.