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Although the media portrays military marriages as short-term unions that typically end in divorce due to repeated deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq, new research indicates that the actual divorce rate among military families has not risen in over 10 years.
Instead, the year-long Rand Corp. study found that in many cases, war zone deployments strengthened a marriage because of the extra income (tax breaks and combat pay) and gave the deployed spouse a feeling of job satisfaction.
Results of the Study
According to study authors, in 1996, 1.4 percent of marriages with male officers and three percent with enlisted personnel ended in a divorce. In 2000, the numbers actually decreased to 1.2 percent and 2.7 percent. Five years later, the numbers rose slightly to 1.5 and 2.8 percent. However, in the last decade, the rate of military divorces in the United States has not increased, despite conventional beliefs.
While some military marriage experts claim the figures reflect the growing success of family support programs, most believe more research needs to be done in order to offer a comprehensive analysis.
“It's a double-edged thing: Each deployment piles stress upon stress. But at the same time you're learning coping skills,” said author and wife of a Navy chaplain Kristin Henderson.
Disproving Conventional Beliefs
Researchers didn't find a big difference in the rate of divorce between Army and Marine Corps troops who have and haven't been deployed. However, some figures actually show that longer deployment times decrease the divorce rate compared to non-deployed troops.
“The conventional wisdom about how deployments affect military marriages turns out to be wrong,” study authors concluded. “Although some may find these results counterintuitive, in fact, they are consistent with other recent findings.”
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