Threat Appraisal, Recovery Operations, and PTSD Symptoms Among US Air Force Rescue Personnel

Research among military personnel and veterans indicates that subjective appraisal of warzone stressors explains the relation of combat exposure to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), but not the relation of exposure to injury and death to PTSD. Studies have primarily been limited to conventional forces using aggregate measures of warzone stressor exposure. Threat appraisal may play a different role in the emergence of PTSD among military personnel for whom dangerous deployment experiences are more closely associated with exposure to injury and death, such as US Air Force Pararescuemen and Combat Rescue officers.

In a sample of 207 rescue personnel, correlations among various types of warzone stressor exposure, threat appraisal, and postdeployment PTSD symptoms were examined.

The relative strongest correlates of threat appraisal were stressors related to injury, death, and human remains. Although exposure to these stressors was also correlated with PTSD symptom severity, partial correlations of stressor exposure and PTSD symptoms were no longer significant when adjusting for threat appraisal.

Results support the contributing role of threat appraisal to PTSD among military personnel whose primary duties entail exposure to injury and death under hostile and dangerous conditions.