Impact of combat and sexual harassment on the severity of posttraumatic stress disorder among men and women peacekeepers in Somalia
Author: Fontana A, Litz B, Rosenheck R.
Source:
The Journal of nervous and mental disease, 188(3), 163-169.
The impact of combat and sexual harassment on the severity of posttraumatic
stress disorder (PTSD) is compared for 1,307 men and 197 women peacekeepers who
served in the same military units. A theoretical model was proposed to express
the nature of the impact. Structural equation modeling was used to evaluate the
model separately for men and women. Good-fitting, parsimonious models were
developed that showed substantial similarity for men and women. For men, severity
of PTSD symptoms was impacted by exposure to combat directly and indirectly
through fear and sexual harassment. For women, severity of PTSD symptoms was
impacted by combat indirectly through the same two influences, although the
mechanisms involving fear and sexual harassment were somewhat different. For both
genders, moreover, PTSD severity was impacted directly by exposure to the dying
of the Somali people. These similarities suggest that in modern stressful
overseas military missions, both genders may be susceptible to the same types of
risk for the development of PTSD. The incidence and impact of sexual harassment
is particularly noteworthy in the case of men and calls for more detailed
investigation in future studies.