Increasingly, experts recommend that military primary care clinics consider implementing delivery of care based on models of holistic wellness. Several wellness measurement tools exist, but none of these has been applied to a military primary care clinic. In this study, the psychometric testing of two holistic wellness measurement instruments was carried out for possible use with soldiers in primary care clinics. The instruments tested were the Perceived Wellness Model (Adams, Bezner, & Steinhardt, 1998) and the Optimal Living Profile (Renger et al., 2000). Both instruments appear suitable for use in future studies for measuring wellness in Cadet Soldiers. The measures provided by these instruments provide important data that professionals can use to assist young Soldiers in their multidimensional wellness development.

Stability Operations have become the most prevalent mission for U.S. forces in the current global security environment. This research explores new methods to assist in determining when it is acceptable to downsize a force in a stability operation. The methodology developed provides insight into this problem by quantifying force protection risk, mission failure risk, and time in the context of the operational threat environment. The Pythagoras Multi-Agent Simulation and Data Farming techniques are used to investigate force-level comparison in a theoretical threat continuum based on a peacekeeping scenario similar to the Bosnian operation. The data from the simulation is to construct simple tools for decision makers. These tools are used collectively to find the balance, according to a commander's priorities, between the conflicting issues of force protection, mission success, and time. Two areas are identified as significant in achieving success in stability operations. They are troop posturing and troop employment. The problem is that they are often overlooked or under emphasized. The result of this research demonstrates that posturing and employment should be considered as factors equal to force size in contributing to the goal of maximizing force presence. In addition, this research provides a vehicle to assist military planners with ways in which a stability force can maximize and maintain near continuous presence, while simultaneously minimizing the risk to the force and adhere to operational timelines. Overall, the important conclusion in the significance of troop posture on force size transitions. As a force is downsized, it is crucial to evaluate how to maintain presence with the smaller force. This is evident by the surprising success achieved by the smallest force in the simulation. It was able to project a greater presence by utilizing small dispersed units, much like the Combined Action Platoons in Vietnam.

This thesis studied the retention of United States Naval Academy Voluntary Graduate Education Program (VGEP) and Scholarship participants in graduating classes of 1983-1998. The comparison group of nonparticipants consisted of USNA graduating classes 1983-1998 with an Academic Quality Point Rating (AQPR) comparable to the early graduate education students. AQPR was used in order to make the academic backgrounds similar for the participants and non-participants. The retention behavior of program participants and nonparticipants was compared to determine if participation in early graduate education affected retention. The models analyzed retention to each year of service between six and twelve years. In the retention models for unrestricted line officers, both VGEP and Scholarship had a small positive effect on retention to 7 YCS. Although the adjusted differences in retention are not large in magnitude, the results dispel the notion that early graduate education programs are used as vehicles by junior officers to facilitate transition to the civilian labor market following expiration of their initial service obligation. No changes to the service obligations for these programs were recommended.

M.A. / Violence being a prominent and invasive factor in South Africa has left many people feeling powerless, hopeless and incapable of dealing and coping with the effects that exposure to trauma has produced. This idea appears even more disturbing if one considers that military personnel will inevitably be exposed to some form of trauma in their employment history. As a result of this traumatic exposure, many people develop post traumatic stress disorder or symptoms thereof. The literature ind icates that certain variables may increase vulnerability for the development of this disorder. The purpose of this research was to evaluate whether or not there is a relationship between Post Traumatic Stress (PTS) symptoms and axis II personality traits using Millon’s Clinical Multiaxial Inventory (MCMI - III) as a measure. The results of which will have major implications for our understanding of PTS, as well as aid in the deployment of military personnel. The sample comprised 5853 military personnel who completed the MCMI III as part of a yearly project to determine their mental health status. Inferential and descriptive statistical analyses were used on the data. It was found, in accordance with previous literature findings, that narcissistic, antisocial and borderline personality styles are the best predictors of PTS. In addition, the study found that there is a significant relationship between PTS and various personality styles, namely depressive, schizotypal, borderline, passive -aggressive, compulsive, antisocial and narcissistic personality styles. It is recommended that if the MCMI-III is used to scan military personnel prior to combat, those with high scores on borderline, narcissistic and antisocial personality scales, should be subjected to a more in-depth evaluation.

The American GI’s experience in hospital during World War II is absent from official military histories, most scholarly works, and even many oral history collections. Utilizing the papers of WWII infantryman, Leon Standifer, this thesis offers the reader a rare glimpse of WWII military hospital life and chronicles one soldier’s journey from willing obedience to subversive action. This thesis compares the stated goals and procedures of the US Army medical department to the experience of Leon Standifer, an infantryman who served in northern France during the last year of the war and the American occupation of Bavaria, whose service was marked by several periods of protracted hospitalization. Over the course of five hospitalizations, during which Standifer was treated for bullet wounds, trench foot, and pneumonia, he consistently wrote letters to his family describing his experience. A careful reading of Standifer’s wartime correspondence in conjunction with his published and unpublished writings, secondary source material, and military records, suggest that while isolated in the hospital, after killing and experiencing the death of his comrades, Standifer lost his desire to fight. He began to make calculated decisions based on his knowledge of the military medical system in an attempt to ensure his survival and control the remainder of his military service.

Military personnel who have served during Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom, and Operation New Dawn have experienced longer and more frequent deployments than U.S. personnel involved in any previous conflict. These multiple tours in combat zones have resulted in complex psychosocial needs for military personnel. The goal of this action research study was to understand social workers' perceptions and experiences of military personnel who experienced 3 or more deployments in a combat zone. The theoretical foundation for the study was narrative theory. Research questions sought to understand the social workers' perceptions of the psychosocial treatment needs of these veterans, to understand the social workers' experiences in providing services to address their needs, and whether participants perceived that the services provided were enhancing the mental and social well-being of the veterans. Data were collected from a focus group of 8 master's-degree-level social workers who worked with veterans with multiple deployments. Data were analyzed using descriptive coding to determine categories and themes. Findings included increased incidents of posttraumatic stress disorder and complex psychosocial needs, the importance of evidence-based practice and successful reintegration, clinical considerations, and potential barriers to effective service. Findings also focused on the importance of organizational support and continuing education for social workers providing these services. The findings of this study might be used to promote positive social change by highlighting the need for ongoing education for social workers, organizations, and society to provide informed evidence-based treatment for veterans who have experienced multiple deployments.

The intent and direction of this thesis is to recognize personal and social concerns that influence soldiers’ reintegration process. The missing element in current literature is capturing the soldiers’ lived experiences, ideas, perspective and knowledge of what it truly means to be a soldier and having to reintegrate back into the civilian life after being submerged the military culture for an extended period of time. One of the vital concerns to the soldiers is how civilians, specifically the community, politicians, scholars and mental health providers, are not necessary fully aware nor do they recognize the influential impacts of the experiences and environment the military culture has over the soldiers. Soldiers may suffer from depression, anxiety, isolation, alienation, lack of belonging and perceived burdensomeness upon returning home. Previous research often from the civilian point of view expects soldiers to face personal and social concerns, but this research does not allow soldiers to speak for themselves – from their military perspective and lived-experiences. The mission of this thesis, with the support of members of the US Army, is to help bridge the disconnect in communication and the lack of understanding between the two cultures, military and civilian, in order to work together to find a more improved solution on helping soldiers reintegrate processes. The main objective of the mission is to increase our awareness and understanding on who a soldier is, who they develop into and who they become throughout their military career, and how this influences their reintegration journey.

Historical analyses of soldiers in the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) during the Great War have focused overwhelming on combat experiences and the environment of the trenches. By contrast, little consideration has been made of the non-combat experiences of these individuals, or of the time they spent behind the front lines. Far from military experiences revolving around combat and trench warfare, the letters, diaries, and memoirs of working class men suggest that daily life for the rank and file actually revolved around work, and in particular manual labour. Through a focus on working class men???s experiences in the AIF during the Great War, this dissertation seeks to discover more about these experiences with work in an attempt to understand the broader aspects of life in the military. In this environment of daily work, many working class men also came to approach military service as a job of work, and they carried over the mentalities of the civilian workplace into their daily life in the military. This dissertation thus seeks to understand how workplace cultures were transferred from civilian workplaces into the military. It explores working class men???s approaches towards daily work in two different theatres of war, Gallipoli and the Western Front, in order to highlight the significance of work within military life. Furthermore, it evaluates aspects of this workplace culture, such as relations with employers, the use of workplace skills, and the implementation of industrial relations methods, to understand the continuities between the lives of civilians and soldiers. Finally, this dissertation is not a military history: it adopts a culturalist approach towards the lives of people in the AIF, and in the environment of the Great War, in an effort to place the military experiences of these working class men within the context of their broader civilian lives.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 226-233).

The purpose of this thesis is to study how swedishness is constructed and narrated in two Swedish documentary series that picture the Swedish participation in the international ISAF mission in Afghanistan. The main focus lies on how the Swedish soldier as such is portrayed, on which values, characteristics and qualities that they are said to embody and how these are linked to notions of swedishness, particularly the strong historical narrative, formed during the second half of the twentieth century, that defines Sweden as a peaceful, neutral and humanitarian state, with peaceful, enlightened and democratically minded citizens. Theoretically it draws on the concept of metanarrative to explain how ideas of shared national origin translates in to a broad organizing discourse, that defines, interprets and communicates notions of what it means to be a Swede and what is needed to make claims on swedishness. Another concept, that of national bodyscape, is also used to further define and explain how ideas of nationality are embodied and take the form of specific characteristics and  personal qualities. The meaning-making in these two series makes use of the above mentioned definition of swedishness as defined by humanitarian concerns, democratic ideals and moral superiority to construct an image of the Swedish soldiers as on the one hand soft, humanitarians, who are needed in Afghanistan because of their especially strong sense of justice and moral, and, on the other, as tough soldiers, who are able to participate in every aspect of the war as fighters. These two images combined create a notion of a particularly Swedish type of soldier, who brings the separate roles of soldier, humanitarian worker and diplomat together and realises them in one individual, and who appears to be more capable in all these roles than both their American and Afghan allies. By shifting the narrative focus and change which part of the Swedish metanarrative that they choose to connect to, the series can also maintain the emphasis on the soldiers as Swedes, while at the same time showing them participating in situations or discussing aspects of their work that is not usually associated with swedishness, or that previously has not been a part of the broader metanarrative.