The enduring well-being impacts of attending the Battle Back Multi Activity Course for the lives of recovering UK armed forces personnel

ABSTRACT

Few adventurous training courses have been formally designed to assist military personnel in their recovery and/or transition into civilian life by supporting psychological health and well-being. This study examines, for the first time, the longitudinal effects of a five-day Multi Activity Course (MAC) on the mental well-being of serving but wounded, injured, and/or sick (WIS) UK armed forces personnel. The MAC is delivered using a participant-centered approach to encourage engagement in adaptive sports, adventurous activities, and personal development coaching sessions. This work extends previous research showing powerful short-term well-being benefits. Measures of positive well-being and psychological need satisfaction were provided by participants before and after attending the course, as well as two weeks, three months, six months and 12 months later. Self-reported well-being measures of psychological need satisfaction and positive mental well-being improved significantly throughout the course. These remained significantly higher at six and 12 months after the course, respectively.

KEYWORDS:

• Military
• recovery
• well-being
• outdoor activities
• physical activity
• health coaching

Disclosure statement

The funders of the research study had a role in the design of the MAC and its delivery but not in the design of the research study process, the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data, in the writing of the manuscript, or in the decision to publish the results.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Royal British Legion.