Quality of Life in the U.S. Navy: Impact on Performance and Career Continuance

Abstract

Previous research has shown the importance of quality of life (QOL) for critical organizational outcomes such as the retention of U.S. Navy personnel (Wilcove, Schwerin, & Wolosin, 2003) and Marines (Hindelang, Schwerin, & Farmer, 2004). These studies employed a life domains approach addressing a full range of work and non-work life needs as well as specific aspects of each life domain. In contrast, most other research exploring outcomes critical to military organizations focused only on work life needs of personnel (e.g., job satisfaction, organizational commitment, command climate). This study extends previous research by (a) including both performance and career-continuance plans of personnel as outcomes of interest, (b) exploring the contribution of an additional life need—spiritual well-being—to the measurement of QOL, and (c) examining changes in perceptions of QOL over time between 1999 and 2002 among U.S. Navy personnel. Implications of findings to military personnel, families, and manpower and personnel policy as well as future directions for research are discussed.

Notes

The views expressed in this article are our own and do not reflect the official policy or position of the U.S. Navy, Department of Defense, or the U.S. government.

¹ Schwerin (2006) presents a critical review of QOL theories, models, and studies pertaining to U.S. branches of the armed services.

²For the t-test analyses, the proportion of individuals in the population for a given pay grade was divided by the proportion of respondents in that pay grade. The resulting dividend was then used to weight the respondents' responses.

*p < .01

**p < .001.