Good nutrition is important to staying healthy. This is especially important if your job requires you to be physically fit. Given their mandate, police officers must have a readiness to respond quickly and sometimes lastingly to extremely taxing physical situations (Anderson and Plecas, 2008; Anderson, Plecas, & Segger, 2001). Moreover, police work can be extremely stressful, typically involves shift work, and lacks opportunities to properly decompress during long shifts (Anderson, Litzenberger, & Plecas, 2002; Gilmartin, 2002). These basic features of police work provide several reasons why members should be attentive to good nutrition. Beyond that, good nutrition may assist officers to cope with stress or prevent the development of illnesses or diseases (Martinussen, Richardsen, & Burke, 2007). Yet, whether police officers pay sufficient attention to good nutritional habits while on shift is unknown.
