Families serve too: military spouse well-being after separation from active-duty service

ABSTRACT

Background and Objectives

Transitioning from military to civilian life can be challenging for families, but most research focuses only on the service member. We applied a life course model to assess spouse well-being following this important transition.

Design

Prospective, longitudinal survey of service members and their spouses

Methods

We captured three spouse well-being domains: psychological health, physical health, and family relationships. We identified differences between families who separated from service and those still affiliated (N = 4,087) and assessed baseline factors associated with spouse well-being after the family separated from service (N = 1,199).

Results

Spouses of service members who had separated from the military (versus those who had not) reported poorer mental health and family relationship quality at baseline and follow-up. After controlling for baseline differences, spouses whose families transitioned experienced a greater increase in PTSD symptoms and a steeper decline in quality of marriage. Spouses of active-duty service members reported greater increases in work–family conflict. Among families who had transitioned, the most consistent predictor of positive outcomes was baseline well-being. Protective factors included having more psychological and social resources and less financial stress.

Conclusions

Several protective and risk factors identified in the study may inform programming for families transitioning from active duty.

KEYWORDS:

• Well-being
• transition
• military spouses
• health
• military family

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the other contributing members of the Millennium Cohort Family Study Team from Abt Associates, including Samantha Karon and Anna Garner; as well as members from the Deployment Health Research Department, Naval Health Research Center, including Lauren Bauer, MPH; Carlos Carballo, MPH; Alejandro Esquivel, MPH; Jackie Pflieger, PhD; Sabrina Richardson, PhD; Evelyn Sun, MPH; and Lexi Takata. The authors gratefully acknowledge the members of the Millennium Cohort Family Study Team from the Center for Child and Family Health, including John Fairbank, PhD; Robert Murphy, PhD; and Ernestine Briggs-King, PhD. In addition, the authors express their gratitude to the Family Study participants, without whom this study would not be possible.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Disclaimer

I am a military service member or employee of the U.S. Government. This work was prepared as part of my official duties. Title 17, U.S.C. §105 provides that copyright protection under this title is not available for any work of the U.S. Government. Title 17, U.S.C. §101 defines a U.S. Government work as work prepared by a military service member or employee of the U.S. Government as part of that person’s official duties.

Report No. 20–70 was supported by the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command under work unit no. N1240. The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Department of the Navy, Department of Defense, nor the U.S. Government.

The study protocol was approved by the BLINDED Institutional Review Board in compliance with all applicable Federal regulations governing the protection of human subjects. Research data were derived from an approved BLINDED Institutional Review Board protocol number NHRC.2015.0019.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Department of Defense.