Page 27 - Biobehavioral Resilence to Stress

4 Biobehavioral Resilience to Stress

Psychological Screening: Predicting Resilience to Stress

Screening for emotional problems routinely occurs at recruitment and
military enlistment stations. Nonetheless, even after preenlistment screening

is conducted, large numbers of military personnel are separated from the
military due to behavioral or mental health problems. For example, in the U.S.

Air Force alone, 15.8% of first-term enlistments from 1994 to 1999 were later
separated due to behavioral or mental health problems (Garb & Fiedler, 2006).

This raises the question of how early screening might be improved to better
identify individuals who are at risk or vulnerable to psychological disorder.
Research-based psychological screening questionnaires have been devel-
oped, but their use in the military is still limited. These measures do not directly

address resilience to stress per se, but they do pose questions related to preservice
adjustment history. As will be made clear in this chapter, there is a large body of
research to indicate that individuals who have a history of serious mental illness
or criminal behavior are less likely to deal with stress in a resilient manner.
This chapter begins with a review of the need for, and current practices

associated with, early psychological screening in the military. Note that not

all military psychological screening practices and specific contexts will be
covered here. For instance, our review does not consider instruments specifi -
cally designed for pre- or postdeployment screening (e.g., Deployment Risk
and Resilience Inventory; King, King & Vogt, 2003). Rather, our emphasis is
on current practices, needs, and possibilities with respect to screening at the
time of recruitment/enlistment and basic training. We also address research

findings relevant to demographic, psychological, behavioral, and experien-
tial factors that may be helpful in the assessment of risk versus resilience to
stress. Finally, we consider how currently available information and knowl-
edge might be applied to support the development of improved early screen-
ing instruments and procedures.

Why Is Psychological Screening Important?

Although it may seem obvious that the military should want to employ only
the most stress-resilient personnel available, it can be diffi cult to generate
consensus support on how best to implement this ideal as a practical matter.
Commanders in charge of recruitment sometimes discourage the use of
recruitment-level screening procedures that might significantly reduce the

number of potential available recruits. Training commanders who welcome
recruitment-level screening may frown upon subsequent procedures that
tend to increase attrition from basic military training (BMT). Finally, fi eld
commanders would be pleased to see their attrition rates reduced by more
effective screening at enlistment processing and during basic training.

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