Citation

Weisenhorn DA, Frey LM, Venne J, Cerel J. J. Child Fam. Stud. 2017; 26(1): 161-167.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2017, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s10826-016-0538-y

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Alarming numbers of military veterans end their lives each day which has a profound effect on the military population. This study examines a sample (N = 434) of suicide-exposed (i.e., personally knowing someone who has died by suicide) veterans to determine whether the proportion of individuals who report high impact from suicide exposure and those who have clinically-significant posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms is related to marital status. Using Hill's (Social Casework 49: 139-150, 1958) ABC-X model for conceptualizing the relationships between variables, mean scores for posttraumatic stress disorder were significantly different between groups, and the odds of a married veteran reporting high-impact suicide exposure were 2.19 times lower than the odds of a single veteran reporting high-impact. Likewise, the odds of a veteran with high-impact suicide exposure having clinically-significant posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms were 10.04 times higher than veterans with low-impact suicide exposure.

FINDINGS indicate that veterans who are married are less likely to be highly-affected by another individual's suicide. Thus, marriage is a protective factor for suicide-exposed veterans.

Language: en