Abstract
The purpose of this study is to provide an analysis of the link between deployments and divorces among military families by various groups of potential interest for policymakers. We contribute to the literature on the marital dynamics of military families by providing a multifaceted look at the effect of a stressor, deployment, on the stability of military families defined by race, education, branch, and number of deployments. We find that the effect of deployment on the hazard of divorce is similar by race. The effect differs by education and is strongest for high school graduates. We also find that pre-9/11 deployment increased the divorce hazard, and the effect of post-9/11 deployments on divorce was similar across military services. Finally, time spent in deployment before marriage increases the risk of divorce after marriage. Our work will potentially inform policymakers in designing effective interventions to help families to cope with the stresses of deployments, as we draw attention to the role of expectations, self-selection, and stress from separation.
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Notes
- 1.
It is also possible that some of the effect Negrusa and Negrusa (2014) attribute to factors unrelated to PTSD symptoms may in fact be attributable to PTSD symptoms to the extent that some service members do not report their PTSD symptoms on the PDHA/PDHRA forms.
- 2.
Service members not wanting a divorce can request a stay under SCRA. “Servicemembers often face custody and visitation disputes, especially in light of the increasingly high number of female soldiers deployed. These soldiers usually try to stay the custody proceedings under SCRA, absent any abuse or neglect, and begin gathering evidence to be used in a custody battle based on factors the judge must consider. The soldier is at a disadvantage in a custody suit brought before the court either during or after deployment, because the other parent has often gained an advantage by being the custodial parent during the deployment.” (Baughn, 2005–2006)
- 3.
All models presented in this study are estimated as individual-level discrete hazard models of divorce in a calendar quarter and include, along the main variables discussed in the text, controls for age, age at marriage, years in military, time married, military rank, 1-digit DoD occupation indicators, AFQT scores, months since last deployment, and calendar quarter indicators.
- 4.
Pooling all races in an overall model in which we included only a simple “months in deployment” variable and interactions of this variable with the race indicators, provides evidence that the differences in the effect of deployment are statistically significantly different across races (model not shown for space considerations). However, a direct test of statistical differences in the deployment effects by race shown in Fig. 3.1 is not feasible, given the lack of variation in a pooled model that includes a full set of interactions between all deployment time variables in Table 3.2 and the race indicators.
- 5.
In the absence of additional data, we can only speculate on the reasons why the effects are statistically insignificant for Marine Corps families. Potential explanations may be that these families are better equipped to deal with the risks of deployments, or that there is simply insufficient variation in the data to accurately estimate distinct deployment effects by period of marriage formation and by deployment period (before or after 9/11). The latter hypothesis is more likely, given that in a simplified model in which we only include the “months deployed” variable and its squared term yields a coefficient of +0.042 (significant at 5 %).
- 6.
Similar to the excursion for the race groups described in footnote 4, we find evidence of statistically significant differences across branches in a pooled model including a “months in deployment” variable interacted with the branch indicators.
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Negrusa, S., Negrusa, B., Hosek, J. (2016). Deployment and Divorce: An In-Depth Analysis by Relevant Demographic and Military Characteristics. In: MacDermid Wadsworth, S., Riggs, D. (eds) War and Family Life. Risk and Resilience in Military and Veteran Families. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-21488-7_3
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