How military service members interpret their regretted actions and inactions

Williams, Christian Lewis

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/105564 Copy

Description

Title

How military service members interpret their regretted actions and inactions

Author(s)

Williams, Christian Lewis

Issue Date

2018-11-28

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Berenbaum, Howard

Doctoral Committee Chair(s)

Berenbaum, Howard

Committee Member(s)

• Greene, Jennifer
• Aber, Mark
• Cohen, Joseph
• Osborne, Nicholas
• McCracken, Stanley

Department of Study

Psychology

Discipline

Psychology

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Degree Level

Dissertation

Keyword(s)

• PTSD
• veterans
• moral injury
• trauma

Abstract

The present studies investigated regretted actions and inactions of military Veterans. Utilizing a mixed methods approach, the aim of these studies was: (a) to estimate the prevalence and characteristics of acts of commission (actions) and omission (inactions) resulting in either physical or emotional harm to others; (b) gather descriptions of the events that Service Members consider to be acts of commission and omission; and (c) to explore Veterans’ interpretations of these (in)actions. Samples of 505 (19% female) and 14 (7% female) Iraq/Afghanistan military Veterans participated in our questionnaire and interview studies respectively. Questionnaire participants completed measures of the prevalence and interpretation of (in)actions (e.g., altered worldviews), psychological problems (e.g., PTSD) and combat/post-combat experience. Interview participants described wartime events and how they interpreted their (in)actions over time. We recruited our sample from local Veterans’ organizations and a crowdsourcing website (MTurk). We found that (in)actions were fairly common (49.3% reported at least one). Service Members’ descriptions, interpretations, and endorsement of psychological problems differed based on the type of (in)action they reported. When compared to other types of (in)actions, acts of commission resulting in physical harm to others (Commission-Physical) had distinct characteristics with regards to context (e.g., most likely to occur during combat), outcome (e.g., only depicted harm to non-Service Members), interpretation (e.g., least likely to be regretted) and psychological outcomes (e.g., when regretted, Commission-Physical actions were most-strongly associated with PTSD). Different types of (in)actions also appear to be associated with alterations to Service Members’ worldviews in different ways (e.g., whether changes occur to one’s conceptualization of oneself vs. others/the world). Altered worldviews was also the only interpretation variable that predicted psychological problems independently of other interpretation variables (e.g., guilt/shame) when other factors were accounted for (e.g., age, combat experience).

Graduation Semester

2019-08

Type of Resource

text

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/105564

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2019 Christian Williams

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