Local social norms and military sexual stressors: do senior officers' norms matter?

OBJECTIVE: To examine the relative importance of harassment-tolerant norms emanating from troops senior officers, immediate supervisors, and units on troops' sexual stressor experiences and to see whether associations differed by sex. METHOD: Cross-sectional survey of all 681 willing and confirmed active duty troops enrolled in the VA National Enrollment Database between 1998 and 2002. Findings extended an earlier analysis. RESULTS: After adjusting for other significant correlates, senior officers' perceived tolerance of sexual harassment was not associated with the severity of sexual harassment troops reported (p = 0.64) or with the numbers of sexual identity challenges they reported (p = 0.11). Harassment-tolerant norms emanating from troops' units and immediate supervisors were associated with reporting more severe sexual harassment and more sexual identity challenges (all p < 0.003). Findings generalized across sex. CONCLUSIONS: Senior officers' norms did not appear to affect troops' reports of military sexual stressors, but unit norms and immediate supervisors' norms did.

Functioning and psychiatric symptoms among military men and women exposed to sexual stressors.

OBJECTIVE: The goal was to describe military men's and women's functioning and psychiatric symptoms according to their military sexual stressor exposure. METHOD: A cross-sectional survey of 204 Army soldiers and 611 other active duty troops (487 men and 327 women) was performed. RESULTS: Forty-five percent of men and 80% of women reported at least one sexual stressor type (i.e., sexual identity challenges, sexual harassment, or sexual assault). After adjustment, subjects reporting more types of sexual stressors had poorer physical, work, role, and social functioning; more-severe post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and anxiety symptoms; and more somatic concerns, compared with subjects reporting fewer or no sexual stressor types (all p < or = 0.004). Interactions by gender were insignificant (all p > 0.11). Within sexual stressor category, men and women reported similar mean adjusted functioning and psychiatric symptoms. CONCLUSIONS: For both men and women, impaired functioning and more severe psychiatric symptoms were more common among those reporting more types of sexual stressors.