Publication year
2017
Citation Title
Child mental health symptoms following parental deployment: The impact of parental posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, marital distress, and general aggression.
Journal Name
SAGE Open
Journal Volume
7
Issue Number
3
DOI
10.1177/2158244017720484
Summary
Marital distress, aggression, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms are commonly linked in research. However, less often is the consideration of the impact on children, and specifically, their increased mental health symptoms. This study examined child mental health symptoms after a parent returns from deployment and suggests that general parental aggression (e.g., threatening, fighting, damaging property) is a key mechanism in children's mental health.
Key Findings
Military parents who had recently returned from deployment, demonstrated PTSD symptoms, and acted aggressively had children with greater mental health concerns.
Parental PTSD symptoms impacted children's mental health independent of marital distress.
Parental aggression may be a mechanism through which parental PTSD symptoms and marital distress affect children's mental health.
Implications for Program Leaders
Educate Service members and their spouses on the impact of general aggression on their children's mental health
Offer classes for Service members returning from combat deployments regarding PTSD, general aggression, marital distress, and their impact on children's mental health
Offer pre- and post-deployment anger management workshops for Service members
Implications for Policy Makers
Promote reintegration programs that include emotion regulation components
Recommend the development of programs that support military families through the deployment process
Encourage training for professionals who work with military families to consider the overall family dynamics, including effects on children, when there is marital distress, PTSD symptoms, or parental aggression
Methods
This study was part of a larger study that involved 974 Soldiers in a brigade combat team. A subset of the participants, 169 Soldiers, were included in this study, with the inclusion criteria being that Soldiers had at least one child (age 3 to 17 years) at home.
Surveys were collected via large groups of Soldiers who completed them in approximately 1 hour.
Soldiers provided data about parental PTSD symptoms, child mental health symptoms, marital distress, and general aggression.
The data were examined to explore possible links between PTSD, child symptoms, marital distress, and aggression.
Participants
Participants were Active Duty Soldiers, with the following ranks: junior enlisted (29%), non-commissioned officers (62%), and officers/warrant officers (9%).
Ninety-seven percent were male, 95% married, with one child (48%), two children (33%), or three or more children (17%).
Sixty-two percent of the participants had been on more than one deployment, and the average number of years in the military were 8.91 (SD = 5.43).
Limitations
The sample was composed mostly of fathers, therefore the findings may not be generalizable to female Soldiers who are mothers.
Aggression was not categorized by types of aggression and anger was not examined separately. Therefore, it is difficult to determine what exact behaviors most increased child mental health symptoms.
Data were not gathered about martial distress and general aggression prior to the deployment; without this information there is no clear evidence of the direction of effects.
Avenues for Future Research
Examine specific types of anger and aggression to discover if they impact child mental health symptoms differently
Develop long-term studies that follow military families through the deployment cycle to provide a clearer picture of the relationships among marital distress, PTSD symptoms, parental aggression, and child mental health symptoms
Conduct a similar study with female Soldiers who are mothers to determine whether their responses are similar to or different from male Soldiers who are fathers
Focus
Army
Target Population
Population Focus
Military Branch
Military Component
Abstract
The current study examined the impact of active duty service members’ symptoms following a combat deployment on child mental health symptoms. Soldiers from a brigade combat team (N = 974) participated in the study 2 months following return from a 15-month combat deployment to Afghanistan, of which 169 soldiers (17.3%) reported having at least one child living at home. Results supported two research hypotheses examining the interrelationship between parental posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms, general aggression, and marital distress on child mental health. First, the study documented a moderate association between parental PTSD symptoms and child mental health symptoms during the postdeployment reintegration period. This association was significant even after accounting for marital distress. Second, the study demonstrated that the impact of PTSD symptoms on child mental health symptoms may be explained by parental general aggression such that aggression mediated the PTSD symptoms–child mental health association.
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