Inpatient psychiatric combat veterans' attitudes toward contemporary issues: A changing generation?

✍ Scribed by James E. Pendorf

• Book ID: 102445682
• Publisher: Springer
• Year: 1989
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 425 KB
• Volume: 2
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0894-9867
• DOI: 10.1002/jts.2490020208

✦ Synopsis

Eighty military combat veterans (M age = 39.9 years) hospitalized for symptoms of traumatic stress completed a 29-item questionnaire addressing such societal topics as political po wer, police authority, drugs, societal laws, religion, and sexual attitudes. Responses are compared to a sample of their adolescent age cohorts (N = 93) and their parents' age cohorts (N = 91) who answered the same questionnaire 20 years ago. Compared to the adolescent cohort sample, combat veterans' attitudes toward societal issues were significantly different on 87% of these issues. Now their parents'age, these veterans'attitudes are significantly different from 70% of the items as those of theirparents'cohort 20 years ago. These results demonstrate how combat Vietnam veterans' attitudes toward some salient societal issues have shifted dramatically from those of their peers a generation ago, yet are also considerably different from the attitudes held by their parents' cohorts at that same time.