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Gender, Mental Health and the Military

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The Palgrave International Handbook of Gender and the Military

Abstract

This chapter explores mental health in a military context, demonstrating the contribution attention to gender can bring. Rather than approaching gender as differences between men and women in their experiences of mental health problems and military life, I adopt an approach which looks more broadly at the links between military culture, emotional control and the construction of masculinity. I trace the way these interact in the experience and study of mental health problems in armed forces personnel through the issues of pre-existing vulnerabilities and recruitment, mental health stigma, and traumatic responses to combat and military sexual assault. I argue attention to gender can make visible the complex and politically charged context in which mental health problems in military are understood and negotiated.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Examples include the Kings Centre for Military Health Research and the associated Academic Department for Military Mental Health in the UK which bring together Ministry of Defence and academic research interests, and the Veterans Health Administration Office of Research and Development in the US.

  2. 2.

    The 16 vulnerability factors in the study were: (1) Did not come from a close family; (2) Used to get shouted at a lot at home; (3) Often used to play truant from school; (4) Did not feel valued by family; (5) Regularly used to see fighting between parents; (6) No member of family who they could talk to; (7) Regularly hit or hurt by a parent or caregiver; (8) Parents had problems with alcohol or drugs; (9) Family did not used to do things together; (10) Spent time in local authority care; (11) No special teacher/youth worker/family friend who looked out for them; (12) Often in fights at school; (13) No activity which made them feel special/proud; (14) Suspended or expelled from school; (15) Problems with reading and writing at school; (16) Problems and trouble with police (Iversen et al. 2007 p. 507).

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Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the editors for bringing together this volume and for their very useful comments on an earlier draft. Thanks also to Emily Hughes, Victoria Loughlan and the staff at Centre for Mental Health for their support.

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  1. University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK

    Hilary Cornish

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  1. Hilary Cornish
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Correspondence to Hilary Cornish .

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  1. School of Geography, Politics & Sociology, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom

    Rachel Woodward

  2. Department of Politics & International Relations, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, United Kingdom

    Claire Duncanson

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Cornish, H. (2017). Gender, Mental Health and the Military. In: Woodward, R., Duncanson, C. (eds) The Palgrave International Handbook of Gender and the Military. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51677-0_17

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