Military-related stress, self-efficacy, and anxiety: Investigating the role of marital quality in military couples

Lucier-Greer, M., Frye-Cox, N., Reed-Fitzke, K., Ferraro, A. J., & Mancini, J. A. (2023). Military-related stress, self-efficacy, and anxiety: Investigating the role of marital quality in military couples. Family Process, 62(3), 1253-1271. https://doi.org/10.1111/famp.12833

A stress process framework and crossover perspective guided this study’s exploration of how an individual’s difficulty with managing military-related stress might relate both to their own and their spouse’s well-being. Responses from 243 military couples (i.e., Service members and their civilian spouses) were analyzed to investigate whether the difficulty Service members and spouses experienced in managing military-related stress was linked with their own and their spouse’s self-efficacy and, in turn, their own and their spouse’s anxiety. Marital quality was considered as a potential buffer against the impact of military stress within military couples. Overall, Service members and spouses who reported greater difficulty in managing military stress tended to report lower self-efficacy and, in turn, higher anxiety. Higher marital quality emerged as a protective factor for civilian spouses, especially regarding their self-efficacy, when they reported a lot of difficulty in dealing with military stress.

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