This longitudinal study examined the ability of the MMPI to identify small-town police officers who will be terminated because of poor performance. Six hundred officers, both men and women, representing 34 small-town police departments were followed over a 13-year period. Discriminant analysis indicated that an "immaturity index," consisting of a combination of the MMPI scales of Psychopathic Deviate, Hypomania, and L, was a strong predictor of termination. Further analysis revealed that a statistical model that combined the immaturity index with department size and MMPI scales of A^and Hysteria was the best predictor of who succeeds and who fails in small-town police. The discussion focuses on the value of the immaturity index for the selection of police officers.

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Questionnaires and Spielberger's State-Trait Anxiety Inventory were administered to rural police officers to determine whether stressful factors were comparable to those of urban officers. Most (90%) indicated the job was stressful, but traditional measures of police stress failed to support this perception. It is suggested that the denial of the effects of stress may be a prerequisite to successful performance in rural law enforcement.