Abstract

Spending on counterterrorism interventions has increased markedly in recent decades despite limited evidence supporting their effectiveness. Effectiveness research is mostly based on statistical modelling of risk and risk reduction and tends to ignore the impact interventions have on the subjective consequences of terrorism in a population – e.g. increased fear and anxiety. Feeling fearful and unsafe is common after terrorism and has been shown to mediate negative health outcomes and reduce work functioning in violence-exposed workers. The primary aim of the present study was to explore if visible security measures and escape- and evacuation training are associated with perceived safety and threat in terror-exposed employees. Data from a three-wave longitudinal questionnaire-based observational study of ministerial employees conducted 10, 22 and 34 months after the terrorist attack on the government headquarters in Oslo, Norway in 2011 was combined with retrospective data on installed visible security measures and escape- and evacuation training in ministries for the same period. The main outcomes were employees’ perceived safety and threat at work, both scored on a 5-point Likert scale. Results were analyzed with multilevel mixed-effects ordered logistic regression. There was some evidence that more installed visible security measures were associated with higher employee perceived safety at work (.020 < p value < .061). The findings on the association between security measures and employee perceived threat were unclear, and there was no evidence that escape- and evacuation training was associated with employee perceived safety or threat. Contrary to what is oftentimes argued in the literature, our study suggests that the installation of visible security measures increases perceived safety in terror-exposed individuals and has no clear effect on perceived threat. Our findings may help close knowledge gaps in counterterrorism effectiveness research and aid decision-makers when discussing post-terrorism strategies and interventions.

摘要

尽管支持其有效性的证据有限，但近几十年来，反恐干预的支出显着增加。有效性研究主要基于风险和风险降低的统计模型，往往忽略干预措施对恐怖主义在人群中的主观后果的影响——例如增加的恐惧和焦虑。在恐怖主义之后感到恐惧和不安全是很常见的，并且已被证明可以调解负面的健康结果并降低暴露于暴力的工人的工作能力。本研究的主要目的是探讨可见的安全措施以及逃生和疏散培训是否与遭受恐怖袭击的员工的感知安全和威胁有关。对部长级雇员进行的基于三波纵向问卷的观察性研究的数据 10, 2011 年挪威奥斯陆政府总部遭受恐怖袭击后 22 个月和 34 个月，并结合了同期各部已安装的可见安全措施以及逃生和疏散培训的回顾性数据。主要结果是员工在工作中感知到的安全和威胁，两者均采用李克特 5 分制评分。结果用多级混合效应有序逻辑回归分析。有一些证据表明，更多安装的可见安全措施与更高的员工感知工作安全相关 (.020 < 主要结果是员工在工作中感知到的安全和威胁，两者均采用李克特 5 分制评分。结果用多级混合效应有序逻辑回归分析。有一些证据表明，更多安装的可见安全措施与更高的员工感知工作安全相关 (.020 < 主要结果是员工在工作中感知到的安全和威胁，两者均采用李克特 5 分制评分。结果用多级混合效应有序逻辑回归分析。有一些证据表明，更多安装的可见安全措施与更高的员工感知工作安全相关 (.020 < p值 < .061）。关于安全措施与员工感知威胁之间关联的调查结果尚不清楚，并且没有证据表明逃生和疏散培训与员工感知安全或威胁相关。与文献中经常争论的内容相反，我们的研究表明，安装可见的安全措施会增加遭受恐怖袭击的个人的安全感，但对感知到的威胁没有明显影响。我们的发现可能有助于缩小反恐有效性研究中的知识差距，并在讨论后恐怖主义战略和干预措施时帮助决策者。