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A Life Events Scale for Armed Forces personnel
Suprakash Chaudhury1, Kalpana Srivastava, M S V Kama Raju
1Associate Professor, Presently Professor and Head, Department of Psychiatry, RINPAS.
Indian Journal of Psychiatry
|September 17, 2010
Summary
A new scale, the Armed Forces Medical College Life Events Scale (AFMC LES), was developed to measure unique stressful life events experienced by service personnel. This scale offers a more relevant assessment tool for military populations compared to existing measures.
Area of Science:
- Psychological assessment
- Military psychology
- Stress and coping
Background:
- Military personnel face unique stressful life events.
- Existing life event scales lack relevance for service members.
- A specialized assessment tool is needed for this population.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and validate a scale measuring life events specific to service personnel.
- To create a culturally relevant tool for assessing military stressors.
- To enhance the understanding of life event impact in armed forces.
Main Methods:
- A multi-stage study involving expert consensus and administration of scales to soldiers and service personnel.
- Development of a 52-item scale with weighted scoring (0-100).
- Normative data collected from 1400 personnel across Army, Air Force, and Navy.
Main Results:
- Service personnel report an average of 4 life events annually and 13 lifetime.
- The Armed Forces Medical College Life Events Scale (AFMC LES) yielded average scores of 115 life change units (past year) and 577 (lifetime).
- The AFMC LES demonstrated concurrent validity with the Presumptive Stressful Life Events Scale (PSLES) and internal consistency.
Conclusions:
- The AFMC LES effectively captures unique stressors faced by service personnel.
- This scale is a valuable tool for assessing stressful life events in military populations.
- It addresses a gap in existing life event assessment tools for Indian and Western contexts.
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