Family Issues Associated with Military Deployment, Family Violence, and Military Sexual Trauma

Today’s military has a greater percentage of families and children in comparison with previous generations. There are many and unique demands on military families made by the ongoing conflicts.1 Military life can be stressful.4 The pile-up of life changes (the sum of normative, nonnormative, and intrafamily strains) may have negative consequences in the family system and/or its members.5 and 6 The presence of an increasing number of stressors is associated with an increased likelihood of domestic violence in veterans.7 Military sexual trauma may be experienced by some service members during both deployment and assignments at duty stations. It is a psychological trauma resulting from physical assault of a sexual nature, battery of a sexual nature, or sexual harassment. Sexual trauma is associated with several negative psychological and physical outcomes