Male Combatants

Citation:

Worthen, Miranda, Sujit D. Rathod, Gregory Cohen, Laura Sampson, Robert Ursano, Robert Gifford, Carol Fullerton, Sandro Galea, and Jennifer Ahern. 2015. “Anger and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Symptom Severity in a Trauma-Exposed Military Population: Differences by Trauma Context and Gender.” Journal of Traumatic Stress 28 (6): 539–46. doi:10.1002/jts.22050.

Authors: Jennifer Ahern, Gregory Cohen, Carol Fullerton, Sandro Galea, Robert Gifford, Sujit D. Rathod, Laura Sampson, Robert Ursano, Miranda Worthen

Annotation:

Studies have found a stronger association between anger and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) severity in military populations than in nonmilitary populations. Two hypotheses have been proposed to explain this difference: Military populations are more prone to anger than nonmilitary populations, and traumas experienced on deployment create more anger than nondeployment traumas. To examine these hypotheses, we evaluated the association between anger and PTSD severity among never-deployed military service members with nondeployment traumas (n = 226) and deployed service members with deployment traumas (n = 594) using linear regression. We further examined these associations stratified by gender. Bivariate associations between anger and PTSD severity were similar for nondeployment and deployment events; however, gender modified this association. For men, the association for deployment events was stronger than for nondeployment events (β = .18, r = .53 vs. β = .16, r = .37, respectively), whereas the reverse was true for women (deployment: β = .20, r = .42 vs. nondeployment: β = .25, r = .65). Among men, findings supported the hypothesis that deployment traumas produce stronger associations between PTSD and anger and are inconsistent with hypothesized population differences. In women, however, there was not a clear fit with either hypothesis.

Topics: Female Combatants, Male Combatants, Health, Mental Health, Military Forces & Armed Groups

Year: 2015

Citation:

Levy, Yagil. 2013. “The Military as a Split Labor Market: The Case of Women and Religious Soldiers in the Israel Defense Forces.” International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society 26 (4): 393–414. doi:10.1007/s10767-013-9146-7.

Author: Yagil Levy

Abstract:

A conflict between religious male soldiers and secular female soldiers has emerged since the 2000s within the Israel Defense Forces. This clash has gradually taken the form of religious rhetoric, articulated by rabbis and other religious activists, that has moved from refraining from publicly questioning the fitness of women as combatants to discourse that gradually delegitimized women’s service. Based on the theoretical theme of the split labor market, I will argue that there is a link between the extent to which the growing introduction of women into field units threatens to devalue the religious youth’s symbolic rewards and the escalation in anti-feminist rhetoric, whose ultimate goal is to exclude women from the military.

Keywords: diversity management, gender exclusion, military service, split labor market

Topics: Combatants, Female Combatants, Male Combatants, Women, Military Forces & Armed Groups, Militaries, Religion Regions: Africa, MENA, Asia, Middle East Countries: Israel

Year: 2013

Citation:

Monteith, Lindsey L., Deleene S. Menefee, Jeri E. Forster, Jill L. Wanner, and Nazanin H. Bahraini. 2015. “Sexual Trauma and Combat During Deployment: Associations With Suicidal Ideation Among OEF/OIF/OND Veterans.” Journal of Traumatic Stress 28 (4): 283–88. doi:10.1002/jts.22018.

Authors: Nazanin H. Bahraini, Jeri E. Forster, Deleene S. Menefee, Lindsey L. Monteith, Jill L. Wanner

Abstract:

Compelling evidence has emerged on the association between military sexual trauma and suicide attempt; however, research investigating how sexual trauma during deployment relates to suicidal ideation has received considerably less attention and has yielded mixed findings. Furthermore, such research has not accounted for other types of trauma that may occur during deployment. Our objectives were to examine whether sexual trauma during deployment was associated with recent suicidal ideation, adjusting for exposure to combat. Our sample included 199 Operation Enduring Freedom/Iraqi Freedom/New Dawn (OEF/OIF/OND) veterans entering inpatient trauma-focused treatment who completed the Beck Scale for Suicide Ideation (Beck & Steer, ) and the Deployment Risk and Resilience Inventory Sexual Harassment and Combat Experiences Scales (King, King, Vogt, Knight, & Samper, ). Deployment-related sexual trauma was significantly associated with recent suicidal ideation, adjusting for age and gender (β = .18, ηp2 = .03) and additionally for combat (β = .17, ηp2 = .02). These findings underscore the importance of assessing for deployment-related sexual trauma when assessing suicide risk in OEF/OIF/OND veterans in inpatient settings.

Topics: Armed Conflict, Female Combatants, Male Combatants, Health, Trauma, Military Forces & Armed Groups, Sexual Violence Regions: MENA, Americas, North America, Asia, Middle East, South Asia Countries: Afghanistan, Iraq, United States of America

Year: 2015

Citation:

Voelkel, Emily, Nicole D. Pukay-Martin, Kristen H. Walter, and Kathleen M. Chard. 2015. “Effectiveness of Cognitive Processing Therapy for Male and Female U.S. Veterans With and Without Military Sexual Trauma.” Journal of Traumatic Stress 28 (3): 174–82. doi:10.1002/jts.22006.

Authors: Emily Voelkel, Nicole D. Pukay-Martin, Kristen H. Walter, Kathleen M. Chard

Abstract:

Military sexual trauma (MST) affects approximately 2% and 36% of male and female veterans, respectively, (e.g., Allard, Gregory, Klest, & Platt, ). Although the deleterious consequences of MST have been clearly established, few studies have explored treatment effectiveness for this population. Using archival data from a residential treatment program, the current study explored the effectiveness of cognitive processing therapy (CPT) in treating full or subthreshold posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) to compare U.S. veterans reporting an MST index trauma (MST-IT) to those without MST-IT. Of the 481 participants, 40.7% endorsed MST-IT. Multiway frequency analyses were utilized to compare men and women with and without MST on baseline demographic variables. Hierarchical linear models were constructed to investigate treatment outcome by MST status and sex. Results showed that 44.8%, 23.8%, and 19.6% of the variation in clinician- and self-reported PTSD and depression symptoms were explained by three models. Scores on all outcome measures significantly decreased over time for both groups. Additionally, women demonstrated a sharper decrease in PTSD symptoms over time than men. Lastly, men who reported MST-IT had higher PTSD symptoms than men without MST-IT on average. With no control group or random assignment, preliminary findings suggest residential treatment including CPT may be effective for MST-IT regardless of sex.

Topics: Female Combatants, Male Combatants, Women, Men, Health, Trauma, Military Forces & Armed Groups, Sexual Violence Regions: Americas, North America Countries: United States of America

Year: 2015

Citation:

Tiet, Quyen Q., Yani E. Leyva, Kathy Blau, Jessica A. Turchik, and Craig S. Rosen. 2015. “Military Sexual Assault, Gender, and PTSD Treatment Outcomes of U.S. Veterans.” Journal of Traumatic Stress 28 (2): 92–101. doi:10.1002/jts.21992.

Authors: Kathy Blau, Yani E. Leyva, Craig S. Rosen, Quyen Q. Tiet, Jessica A. Turchik

Abstract:

This study examined whether gender and military sexual assault (MSA) were associated with psychiatric severity differences at initiation of treatment for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and whether MSA and gender predicted psychiatric treatment outcomes. Male (n = 726) and female (n = 111) patients were recruited from 7 U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) PTSD specialty intensive treatment programs and completed an intake survey; 69% (n = 574) of the participants completed a 4-month postdischarge follow-up survey. Measures included current PTSD and depressive symptoms, aggressive/violent behaviors, alcohol and drug use severity, and quality of life. Multilevel multivariate regression analyses were conducted to examine the main and interaction effects of gender and MSA on psychiatric treatment outcomes at 4-month follow-up, including demographics, baseline severity, hostile fire, and treatment length of stay. Baseline PTSD severity did not differ by gender or MSA status, but women had more severe depressive symptoms (d = 0.40) and less aggressive/violent symptoms (d = −0.46) than men. Gender, MSA status, and the interaction between gender and MSA did not predict treatment outcomes as hypothesized. Male and female veterans with and without MSA responded equally well to treatment in VA PTSD intensive treatment programs.

Topics: Armed Conflict, Female Combatants, Male Combatants, Women, Men, Gender Analysis, Mental Health, Sexual Violence Regions: Americas, North America Countries: United States of America

Year: 2015

Citation:

Muralidharan, Anjana, David Austern, Samantha Hack, and Dawne Vogt. 2016. “Deployment Experiences, Social Support, and Mental Health: Comparison of Black, White, and Hispanic U.S. Veterans Deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq.” Journal of Traumatic Stress 29 (3): 273–78. doi:10.1002/jts.22104.

Authors: David Austern, Samantha Hack, Anjana Muralidharan, Dawne Vogt

Abstract:

Compared to their White counterparts, Black and Hispanic Vietnam-era, male, combat veterans in the United States have experienced discrimination and increased trauma exposure during deployment and exhibited higher rates of postdeployment mental health disorders. The present study examined differences in deployment experiences and postdeployment mental health among male and female Black, Hispanic, and White veterans deployed in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom in Iraq. Data were drawn from a national survey of veterans (N = 924) who had returned from deployment within the last 2 years. Ethnoracial minority veterans were compared to White veterans of the same gender on deployment experiences and postdeployment mental health. The majority of comparisons did not show significant differences; however, several small group differences did emerge (.02 < η2 < .04). Ethnoracial minority veterans reported greater perceived threat in the warzone and more family-related concerns and stressors during deployment than White veterans of the same gender. Minority female veterans reported higher levels of postdeployment symptoms of anxiety than their White counterparts, which were accounted for by differences in deployment experience. These differences call for ongoing monitoring.

Topics: Armed Conflict, Female Combatants, Male Combatants, Gender, Gender Analysis, Mental Health, PTSD, Trauma, Race Regions: Africa, MENA, Americas, North America, Asia, Middle East, South Asia Countries: Afghanistan, Iraq, United States of America

Year: 2016

Citation:

Breyer, Benjamin N., Shona C. Fang, Karen H. Seal, Gayatri Ranganathan, Brian P. Marx, Terence M. Keane, and Raymond C. Rosen. 2016. “Sexual Health in Male and Female Iraq and Afghanistan U. S. War Veterans With and Without PTSD: Findings From the VALOR Cohort.” Journal of Traumatic Stress 29 (3): 229–36. doi:10.1002/jts.22097.

Authors: Benjamin N. Breyer, Shona C. Fang, Terence M. Keane, Brian P. Marx, Gayatri Ranganathan, Raymond C. Rosen, Karen H. Seal

Abstract:

We sought to determine whether posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was associated with sexual health in returned warzone-deployed veterans from the recent Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. We studied 1,581 males and females from the Veterans After-Discharge Longitudinal Registry, a gender-balanced U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs registry of health care-seeking veterans with and without PTSD. Approximately one quarter (25.1%) of males (n = 198) and 12.7% of females (n = 101) had a sexual dysfunction diagnosis and/or prescription treatment for sexual dysfunction. Both genders were more likely to have a sexual dysfunction diagnosis and/or prescription treatment if they had PTSD compared with those without PTSD (male: 27.3% vs. 21.1%, p = .054; female: 14.9% vs. 9.4%, p = .022). Among the 1,557 subjects analyzed here, males with PTSD had similar levels of sexual activity compared to those without PTSD (71.2% vs. 75.4%, p = .22), whereas females with PTSD were less likely to be sexually active compared to females without PTSD (58.7% vs. 72.1%, p < .001). Participants with PTSD were also less likely to report sex-life satisfaction (male: 27.6% vs. 46.0%, p < .001; female: 23.0% vs. 45.7%, p < .001) compared with those without PTSD. Although PTSD was not associated with sexual dysfunction after adjusting for confounding factors, it was significantly negatively associated with sex-life satisfaction in female veterans with a prevalence ratio of .71, 95% confidence interval [.57, .90].

Topics: Armed Conflict, Female Combatants, Male Combatants, Gender Analysis, Mental Health, PTSD, Trauma, Military Forces & Armed Groups Regions: Africa, MENA, Americas, North America, Asia, Middle East, South Asia Countries: Afghanistan, Iraq, United States of America

Year: 2016

Citation:

Millegan, Jeffrey, Lawrence Wang, Cynthia A. LeardMann, Derek Miletich, and Amy E. Street. 2016. “Sexual Trauma and Adverse Health and Occupational Outcomes Among Men Serving in the U.S. Military.” Journal of Traumatic Stress 29 (2): 132–40. doi:10.1002/jts.22081.

Authors: Cynthia A. LeardMann, Derek Miletich, Jeffrey Millegan, Amy E. Street, Lawrence Wang

Annotation:

Although absolute counts of U.S. service men who experience sexual trauma are comparable to service women, little is known about the impact of sexual trauma on men. The association of recent sexual trauma (last 3 years) with health and occupational outcomes was investigated using longitudinal data (2004–2013) from the Millennium Cohort Study. Of 37,711 service men, 391 (1.0%) reported recent sexual harassment and 76 (0.2%) sexual assault. In multivariable models, sexual harassment or assault, respectively, was associated with poorer mental health: AOR = 1.60, 95% CI [1.22, 2.12], AOR = 4.39, 95% CI [2.40, 8.05]; posttraumatic stress disorder: AOR = 2.50, 95% CI [1.87, 3.33], AOR = 6.63, 95% CI [3.65, 12.06]; depression: AOR = 2.37, 95% CI [1.69, 3.33], AOR = 5.60, 95% CI [2.83, 11.09]; and multiple physical symptoms: AOR = 2.22, 95% CI [1.69, 2.92]; AOR = 3.57, 95% CI [1.98, 6.42], after adjustment for relevant covariates. Sexual harassment was also associated with poorer physical health: AOR = 1.68, 95% CI [1.27, 2.22]. Men who reported sexual trauma were more likely to have left military service: AOR = 1.60, 95% CI [1.14, 2.24], and be disabled/unemployed postservice: AOR = 1.76, 95% CI [1.02, 3.02]. Results suggest that sexual trauma was significantly associated with adverse health and functionality extending to postmilitary life. Findings support the need for developing better prevention strategies and services to reduce the burden of sexual trauma on service men.

Topics: Armed Conflict, Male Combatants, Men, Mental Health, PTSD, Trauma, Military Forces & Armed Groups, SV against Men Regions: Americas, North America Countries: United States of America

Year: 2016

Citation:

Theidon, Kimberly. 2016. “Peace in Colombia: A Time to Believe?” Current History, no. Feb 2016 (February): 51–56.

Author: Kimberly Theidon

Abstract:

December 15, 2015, was not just any day in Havana, Cuba. Negotiators gathered in El Laguito, the site of peace negotiations between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, were preparing to announce the results of the 45th round of talks that began three years ago. Now the negotiations had turned to reparations for victims of the longest-running war in the Western Hemisphere. They produced a controversial yet crucial accord that includes both judicial measures to investigate and sanction violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, and extrajudicial measures such as truth-seeking, locating the disappeared, and providing individual and collective reparations to victims of the conflict. The atmosphere was by turns somber and optimistic, reflecting the hopes, doubts, and controversies that have shadowed the peace process. Ending the day on a hopeful note, the government's lead negotiator Humberto de la Calle insisted: "Peace is possible. The time has come to believe in peace."

Topics: Armed Conflict, Combatants, Female Combatants, Male Combatants, DDR, Gender, Women, Peace Processes Regions: Americas, South America Countries: Colombia

Year: 2016

Citation:

Tidy, Joanna. 2015. “Gender, Dissenting Subjectivity and the Contemporary Military Peace Movement in Body of War.” International Feminist Journal of Politics 17 (3): 454–72. doi:10.1080/14616742.2014.967128.

Author: Joanna Tidy

Abstract:

This article considers the gendered dynamics of the contemporary military peace movement in the United States, interrogating the way in which masculine privilege produces hierarchies within experiences, truth claims and dissenting subjecthoods. The analysis focuses on a text of the movement, the 2007 documentary film Body of War, which portrays the antiwar activism of paralyzed Iraq veteran Tomas Young, his mother Cathy and wife Brie. Conceptualizing the military peace movement as a potentially counter-performative reiteration of military masculinity, drawing on Butler's account of gender, subjectivity formation and contestation, and on Derrida's notion of spectrality (the disruptive productivity of the “present absence”), the article makes visible ways in which men and women who comprise the military peace movement perform their dissent as gendered subjects. Claims to dissenting subjecthood are unevenly accorded within the productive duality that constitutes the military peace movement, along gendered lines that can reproduce the privileges and subordinations that underpin militarism.

Keywords: dissent, performativity, Body of War, masculinity, injured veterans

Topics: Combatants, Male Combatants, Gender, Women, Men, Masculinity/ies, Gender Roles, Military Forces & Armed Groups, Militaries, Militarism, Nonviolence Regions: Americas, North America Countries: United States of America

Year: 2015