Military machine service is difficult, demanding and unsafe. Just returning to civilian life also poses challenges for the men and women who have served in the armed forces, according to a recent Pew Enquiry Center survey of 1,853 veterans. While more than seven-in-x veterans (72%) report they had an easy time readjusting to noncombatant life, 27% say re-entry was difficult for them—a proportion that swells to 44% among veterans who served in the ten years since the Sept. eleven, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Why do some veterans have a hard time readjusting to civilian life while others brand the transition with niggling or no difficulty? To answer that question, Pew researchers analyzed the attitudes, experiences and demographic characteristic of veterans to identify the factors that independently predict whether a service member will have an like shooting fish in a barrel or hard re-entry experience.

Using a statistical technique known as logistic regression, the analysis examined the impact on re-entry of 18 demographic and attitudinal variables. Four variables were found to significantly increment the likelihood that a veteran would have an easier time readjusting to noncombatant life and six factors predicted a more than hard re-entry experience.

According to the written report, veterans who were commissioned officers and those who had graduated from higher are more than likely to have an easy time readjusting to their mail-military life than enlisted personnel and those who are high school graduates.1 Veterans who say they had a clear agreement of their missions while serving also experienced fewer difficulties transitioning into noncombatant life than those who did not fully understand their duties or assignments.

In contrast, veterans who say they had an emotionally traumatic feel while serving or had suffered a serious service-related injury were significantly more likely to report problems with re-entry, when other factors are held constant.

The lingering consequences of a psychological trauma are particularly striking: The probabilities of an like shooting fish in a barrel re-entry drop from 82% for those who did not experience a traumatic event to 56% for those who did, a 26 percentage signal reject and the largest change—positive or negative—recorded in this study.2

In improver, those who served in a combat zone and those who knew someone who was killed or injured also faced steeper odds of an like shooting fish in a barrel re-entry. Veterans who served in the post-ix/11 flow also study more difficulties returning to civilian life than those who served in Vietnam or the Korean War/World War Two era, or in periods betwixt major conflicts.

Two other factors significantly shaped the re-entry experiences of mail-9/eleven veterans merely appear to accept had niggling impact on those who served in previous eras. Postal service-9/11 veterans who were married while they served had a significantly more difficult time readjusting than did married veterans of past eras or single people regardless of when they served.

At the aforementioned time, college levels of religious belief, as measured by frequent omnipresence at religious services, dramatically increases the odds that a post-9/11 veteran will have an easier fourth dimension readjusting to civilian life. Co-ordinate to the analysis, a recent veteran who attends religious services at least in one case a week has a 67 per centum chance of having an easy re-entry experience. Amongst post-9/xi veterans who never attend services, the probability drops to 43%.three Amid veterans of other eras, current attendance at religious services is not correlated with ease of re-entry.4

Viii other variables tested in the model proved to be poor predictors of how easily a veteran made the transition from war machine to civilian life. They are race and ethnicity (dissever variables tested the effect of being white, black, Hispanic or some other race); age at fourth dimension of belch; whether the veteran had children younger than 18 while serving; how long the veteran was in the military; and how many times the veteran had been deployed.

Predicting the Ease of Re-entry

This analysis employs a statistical technique known every bit logistic regression to measure the effect of whatsoever given variable on the likelihood that a veteran had an easy or difficult fourth dimension re-entering civilian life while controlling for the effects of all other variables.

To identify the factors that best predicted an like shooting fish in a barrel re-entry, eighteen independent variables were included in the regression model. The variables were chosen based on their predictive ability in previous research. The demographics were: veteran's age at belch; how long the individual served; the veteran'southward education, race and ethnicity (tested as four carve up variables: white, black, Hispanic or some other race); whether the veteran was married or had young children while in the service; highest rank attained; and era in which the veteran served. Other variables tested the affect of specific experiences on re-entry: whether the veteran had been seriously injured while serving; experienced a traumatic or emotionally distressing event; served in a combat or war zone; or served with someone who had been killed or injured. A question that asked veterans whether they understood most or all of the missions in which they participated also was included.

Of the xviii variables in the model, ten turn out to exist meaning predictors of a veteran'south re-entry experience. Four were positively associated with re-entry: being an officeholder; having a consistently articulate understanding of the missions while in the service; being a college graduate; and, for mail service-9/eleven veterans just not for those of other eras, attending religious services frequently. Six variables were associated with a diminished probability that a veteran had an like shooting fish in a barrel re-entry. They were: having a traumatic experience; being seriously injured; serving in the post-9/11 era; serving in a combat zone; serving with someone who was killed or injured; and, for post-9/11 veterans but not for those of other eras, being married while in the service.

Factors that Make Readjustment Harder

Overall, the survey establish that a plurality of all veterans (43%) say they had a "very like shooting fish in a barrel" time readjusting to their mail-military machine lives, and 29% say re-entry was "somewhat easy." But an additional 21% say they had a "somewhat hard" fourth dimension, and 6% had major bug integrating dorsum into civilian life.

Among the 18 variables tested, veterans who experienced emotional or concrete trauma while serving are at the greatest risk of having difficulties readjusting to civilian life. According to the analysis, having an emotionally distressing experience reduces the chances that a veteran would have a relatively easy re-entry by 26 percentage points compared with a veteran who did non have an emotionally sorry experience. Similarly, suffering a serious injury while serving reduces the probability of an easy re-entry by nineteen percent points, from 77% to 58%.

Overall, the survey found that serious injuries and exposure to emotionally traumatic events are relatively common in the war machine. Nearly a third (32%) of all veterans say they had a armed services-related feel while serving that they establish to be "emotionally traumatic or distressing"—a proportion that increases to 43% among those who served since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Nearly one-in-ten veterans (10%) suffered a serious injury; of those who served in the post-9/11 era, 16% suffered a serious injury, in part because service members with serious injuries are more likely to survive today than in previous wars, when those with serious injuries died.

The survey besides pinpoints some of the specific problems faced by returning service members who suffered service-related emotional trauma or serious injury. More than than half (56%) of all veterans who experienced a traumatic event say they take had flashbacks or repeated distressing memories of the experience, and nearly one-half (46%) say they have suffered from post-traumatic stress.v Predictably, those who suffer from PTS were significantly less likely to say their re-entry was piece of cake than those who did non (34% vs. 82%).

According to the model, serving in a gainsay zone reduces the chances that a veteran will accept an easier time readjusting to civilian life (78% for those who did not serve in a combat zone to slightly more than 71% for those who did). Knowing someone who was killed or injured besides lessens the probability that a veteran volition accept an easy re-entry by six percent points (73% vs. 79%).

Service Era and Re-entry

Many veterans who served afterwards Sept. 11, 2001, take experienced difficulties readjusting to civilian life. The model predicts that a veteran who served in the post-9/11 era is 15 percentage points less likely than veterans of other eras to accept an easy time readjusting to life after the military (62% vs. 77%).

A discussion of caution most comparing re-entry experiences between service eras. Those in the post-9/xi era were interviewed relatively before long subsequently they left the military, and their views could reflect the immediacy of their feel and could change over time. For before generations of veterans, their views could have changed from what their views were at a similar bespeak in their post-military lives.

Also, the overall view of veterans of earlier eras could change equally members of this generation die and the limerick of the cohort becomes unlike. As a upshot, these results are best interpreted as the views and experiences of current living veterans from each era, and not necessarily the views each generation held in the years immediately later on leaving the service.

Wedlock and Re-entry

The analysis produced a surprise. Post-9/11 veterans who were married while they were in the service also had a more hard time readjusting to life after the armed services. Overall, being married while serving reduces the chances of an easy re-entry from 63% to 48%.

At showtime glance, this finding seems counterintuitive. Shouldn't a spouse be a source of comfort and back up for a discharged veteran? Other studies of the general population have shown that union is associated with a number of benefits, including better health and higher overall satisfaction with life.6

In fact, the answer to another survey question points to a probable explanation. Post-9/11 veterans who were married while in the service were asked what impact deployments had on their relationship with their spouse. Nearly half (48%) say the bear upon was negative, and this grouping is significantly more probable than other veterans to have had family unit bug after they were discharged (77% vs. 34%) and to say they had a hard re-entry.

Amidst those married while they were in the service, nigh six-in-ten (61%) post-9/xi veterans who had experienced marital issues while deployed too had a hard re-entry. In dissimilarity, about four-in-ten veterans (39%) who reported that deployments had a positive or no touch on their marriage say they had problems re-entering noncombatant life—well-nigh identical to the proportion of then-single post-9/11 veterans (37%) who experienced difficulties re-entering civilian life.

Taken together, these findings underscore the strain that deployments put on a marriage before a married veteran is discharged and afterwards the veteran leaves the service to rejoin his or her family.

Factors that Improve the Chances of an Piece of cake Re-entry

Three variables tested in the model—rank at the time of discharge, how well the mission was understood and education level—emerged every bit statistically meaning predictors of an easy re-entry feel for all veterans. A fourth variable, religiosity equally measured by service attendance, is a powerful predictor of an easier re-entry experience for post-9/11 veterans only non for those who served in before eras.

The model predicts that commissioned officers are ten percentage points more likely than enlisted personnel to feel few if any difficulties readjusting to life at home (85% vs. 74%),7 when all other factors are held constant. Veterans who say they conspicuously understood their missions while serving besides were more probable than those who did not to accept an easier re-entry (77% vs. 67%).viii

College-educated veterans too are predicted to take a somewhat easier time readjusting to life after the military than those with only a high schoolhouse diploma. According to the analysis, a veteran with a college degree is v per centum points more than likely than a high school graduate to have an easy fourth dimension with re-entry (78% vs. 73%).

Over again, a discussion of caution is in order. Veterans in the survey were asked how many years of school they take attended. Some of these higher graduates may take earned their caste well after their discharge from the service.

Religiosity and Re-entry

Amongst the larger factors influencing the re-entry experience of post-9/11 veterans is religious organized religion, equally measured past how often a recent veteran attends religious services. Recent veterans who attend services at least once a week are 24 pct points more than likely to say they had an easy re-entry back into noncombatant life than those who never attend services (67% vs. 43%). This finding is consistent with other studies of the full general population that suggest religious belief is correlated with a number of positive outcomes, including improve physical and emotional wellness, and happier and more satisfying personal relationships.9

The impact of religious observance vanishes if the sample is based only on those who completed their service earlier Sept. 11, 2001. In fact, in that location is barely a ane per centum point difference in the probability of an easy re-entry between older veterans who currently attend religious services and those who never do.

As noted earlier, one reason for the absenteeism of an impact may be related to the question measuring current attendance at religious services. This measure out of attendance may be a good proxy for the religious convictions of more recent veterans. But it may exist a poor estimate of how religious older veterans were immediately after they were discharged from the service. Over the years the religious belief of these older veterans may have changed, obscuring the bear on of religious conviction on their re-entry experience.