Post-Traumatic Growth Leadership: Mitigating Stress in a High-Risk Occupation
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Post-Traumatic Growth Leadership: Mitigating Stress in a High-Risk Occupation Michael D. Wood 1
& Tywanquila
Walker 2 & Amy B. Adler 3 & Coleen L. Crouch 3
Received: 23 January 2019 / Revised: 5 December 2019 / Accepted: 10 December 2019 # Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
Abstract High-risk occupations include exposure to potentially traumatic events that impact mental health. While leadership and benefit finding have been found to buffer the impact of these stressor-strain relationships, specific leadership behaviors that target mental health may also mitigate the impact of occupationally-relevant traumatic experiences. Building on the post-traumatic growth literature, the present study examined the validity of a new Post-Traumatic Growth - Leadership Scale (PTG-LS) that measures leader behaviors designed to promote post-traumatic growth in team members. Junior enlisted U.S. soldiers (N = 1181) completed an anonymous survey 4 months following return from a combat deployment. Results illustrated that the PTG-LS demonstrated good reliability and validity. Soldiers with higher PTG-LS scores accounted for fewer soldiers screening positive for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and depression as well as greater unit cohesion and perceived organizational support, even after accounting for general military leadership and individual benefit finding in separate models. Results also indicated that these domain-specific leadership behaviors buffered the relationship between combat exposure and PTSD. Implications for training leaders, particularly in the aftermath of occupationally-related traumatic events, are discussed. Keywords Miltiary leadership . Posttraumatic growth . Posttraumtic stress disorder .
Depression . Benefit finding . Unit cohesion . Percieved organizational support
Material has been reviewed by the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research. There is no objection to its presentation and/or publication. The opinions or assertions contained herein are the private views of the author, and are not to be construed as official, or as reflecting true views of the Department of the Army or the Department of Defense.
* Michael D. Wood [email protected] Extended author information available on the last page of the article
Occupational Health Science
Engaging in a high-risk occupation often involves exposure to potentially traumatic events. Both exposure to potentially traumatic experiences and the quantity of such experiences are associated with more mental health problems among recovery workers (Perrin et al. 2007), police (Neylan et al. 2002), and military personnel (Thomas et al. 2010). For example, studies have documented that service members reporting multiple deployments are at greater risk for mental health problems such as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and depression (Reger et al. 2009), and service members reporting more combat exposure are more likely to screen positive for PTSD and depression as well (Thomas et al. 2010). Combat experiences are also negatively associated wi
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