Research Questions
In order to understand military wives’ perceptions of how their military lifestyle have impacted their employment status, the following research questions have been developed and continue to be refined:
1) How do female military spouses perceive being married to service members impacts their decision to seek employment or to not seek employment?
2) What meaning do female military spouses make of interactions with employment resources?
Research Design and Methods The research design and methods of a study are constructed based on identifying the research problem, developing the theoretical framework, and reviewing the literature (Merriam, 2009). However, the heart of any research design, according to Maxwell (2013), is the research questions. The research questions help to focus the study and influence the choice of research design and methods for data collection. “More than any other aspect of your design, your research questions will have an influence on, and should be responsive to, every other part of your study” (Maxwell, 2013, p. 73).
Why Qualitative Methods
Qualitative research, also known as interpretive research, produces data that reveal, “how people interpret their experiences, how they construct their worlds, and what meaning they attribute to their experiences” (Merriam, 2009, p. 5). It is often an inductive process that builds on the participants’ perspectives (Maxwell, 2013). Since this pilot study’s goal is to understand military
Military personnel are deployed as part of their job. Usually deployments are out of the country, where most service members are leaving their family behind. With deployment, sometimes you don’t know where military personnel will be going and how long the person may be gone. The most important question is “Are they safe where they are going?” Not only does the person in the military ask these question, but the significant others such as partners and kids worry about these questions, knowing that sometimes these questions won’t have a straight answer. Not only do military personnel suffer from certain emotions and become affect from being away from their family; the family also goes through the same storm. Some are under the assumption that because the family back at home have the benefits provide by the military, they have nothing
It’s possible to distinguish higher levels of employment among female veterans than female non-veterans. In fact, the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs (2016) reports that around 34.2% of women
This paper will review different styles of research design along with how different variables within research can be measured.
A 2013 study aimed to characterize the ability of veterans to reintegrate into civilian life on the basis of their employment status, earnings, and college enrollment (Kleykamp, 2013). To do so, information from the Current Population Survey data was retrieved and analyzed for years 2005 to 2011 (Kleykamp, 2013). It was determined that female veterans are less likely to be employed than male veterans (Kleykamp, 2013). Furthermore, white veterans are less likely to be employed than black veterans (Kleykamp, 2013). Interestingly, more veterans are enrolled in college and these individuals earn more when they are employed (Kleykamp, 2013). This indicates that it is necessary to consider the context of unemployment in terms of different demographic groups because some members of the veteran population are more likely to suffer from unemployment than
Long absences can very often lead to complications in marriages and in relationships with children. Soldiers can miss very important moments because of a war, such as holidays and birthdays. The parent who is not at war also has to take on all of the responsibilities for home, children, and finance while their significant other is deployed. In addition to this, the parent who is left behind often finds themselves dealing with a change in behavior from their children, which is very likely a result from their other parent’s long absence. Many returning veterans blame the complications in their lives after their life in the military on their time deployed. It may seem insignificant, but this is a big reason why military force has an impact on the everyday lives of Americans who do not even serve for a military branch.
This book gives an insight into what American women experienced while their husbands were off at war. This allows us to see how the war affected the women and what changes had to be made to their lives to adapt to the loss of their husband.
The second article, “Military Community Integration and Its Effect on Well-Being and Retention”, Burrell, Durand & Fortado (2003) ask; does integration In the military community affect the spouses
Rowland notes that 80 percent of the women who had jobs wanted to keep them rather than return to their women’s work. (79) Thereafter, once soldiers started to reemerge into the workforce, women’s issues with the government controlling what jobs women can or cannot have started reappearing shortly thereafter.
Women have been part of the military since the Revolutionary War such as nurses and clerical workers, (Street, Vogt and Dutra, 2009, p. 686). While these women did have typical female jobs for that time period, women were of great help because without them, the men who were wounded may not have been taken care of as well and the paperwork may have been backlogged and unorganized. Since then, women have slowly made more entrances in the military in other areas than just medical and desk work. Currently, women occupy 80% of the military occupational specialties and 90% of the careers offered in the military, which is a huge jump from where women were back in World War II or even just a decade ago, (Weiss and DeBraber, 2013, p. 37). With this
In Stress-induced somatization is spouses of deployed and nondeployed serviceman, authors Burton et al.’s (2009) found “spouses of deployed serviceman had significantly higher perceived stress scores than spouses of nondeployed service members”. The authors used a survey research type of study with participatory information was demonstrated in the response information. They describe their main claim is to compare the perceived stress experienced by spouses of deployed versus non deployed servicemen. A sub claim is “compare the level of somatization experienced” in both groups. An additional sub claim is to “determine the relationship between perceived stress and level of somatization experienced by spouses” (p.333)
Most military families face the possibility of a loved one returning to service which can also cause a great deal of fear and unpredictability within the family. Studies also prove that family members struggle with emotional distress and children often have behavioral issues as a result of parents deployed to serve in the military. “The strain of war deployment with associated risk that the service member may be harmed or killed, adds to the stressors inherent in military family life, even in times of peace” (Link, P. E., & Palinkas, L. A. (2013). This also suggest that family separations due to irregular tours and training deployments. Often impact the relationships in the family and can change the family dynamics often leaving one caregiver with a majority of the responsibility of raising a family. The military culture can adversely affect family functioning with inflexible hierarchical relationships, expectations and of obeying rules and
Some military veterans can struggle with returning to civilian life after leaving the military. Both posttraumatic stress disorder and survivor’s guilt can make it harder for the veteran to return back into a civilian way of life. The facts indicate that due to the effects on soldiers and military veterans from them being in war or active duty might make it harder for them to get a job or to go to school to get training so that they can get a job. This not only can put an economic strain on the family because the retired military personal doesn’t have a good job or maybe a stable job, and if they are still receiving pay from the military for the veterans service it is most likely to be very little. It may start to cause issues or problems in marriage and might cause even more uneeded stress of whether or not they can take care of the family. Because of this, a veteran might become depressed and may even start to think that it would be better if they as in the veterans left their family or were gone, or in extreme cases that everyone would be better
The podcast, NPR Programs: Talk of the Nation- Faris Family Fights for Their Military Marriage, was enlightening and informative. I would like to say that I commend Command Sgt. Maj. Chris and Lisa Faris, for the service they are providing and having the courage to talk about their life story so the world can get a glimpse of the strain that military has on service members and their spouses. Command Stg. Maj. Chris Faris and Lisa Frais elaborated that marriage isn’t easy and that couples have to really put forth an effort if they want their marriage to work. This interview discussed the reason behind Command Sgt. Maj. Chris and Lisa Faris deciding to share their struggles within their marriage, how the experience of combat affected their marriage, how their struggles in their marriage affected their children, treatment that’s available, and how social workers can assist.
MILITARY SPOUSES AND THE CHALLENGES OF MILITARY Military spouses role vary in ranks, from enlisted to officers they are all seen and approached in different ways because of the military rank his or her soldiers rank may be. “The role of the officer’s spouse encompasses a set of activities that are mostly traditional” (Harrell, 2001, p. 59). Officer’s spouses often are considered to be as elite as their soldier, depending on their rank, “in fact an officer’s wife becomes an extension of the officer” (Harrell, 2001, p. 61).
Ever since adolescence, I’ve always said “ I would never date or marry someone in the military.” Having stayed consistent, I was convinced that nothing could change my stance, but lone and behold I was wrong. Upon watching military movies or seeing military couples online I avoided the impact of becoming separated from my lover for months at a time, but it wasn’t enough to stop me from falling in love with the man of my dreams. Although us military wives are heavily criticized, i think it is important for people to know the sacrifices us women make so that our husbands can continue to keep our country safe.