Positive Psychology in the Military
Summary
Excerpt
Table Of Contents
- Cover
- Title
- Copyright
- About the author
- About the book
- This eBook can be cited
- Foreword
- Enhancing Functional Fitness through Self – Regulation Initiatives in the Military: An Indian Perspective
- Resilience and Resilience Training: Focus on Military Science
- Built-in Resilience Intervention in Academic Military Education
- From Military to Government Sector Applications: Developing an Organizational Climate Framework to Promote Psychological Health, Well-being and Positive Work Behaviors
- A Positive Psychology Perspective on Predeployment Fitness-For-Duty Evaluations for External Deployments: A Proposition for the South African National Defence Force
- Flourish: Promoting Positivism and Psychological Well-Being in Military
- Appreciating the Strengths of Comrades: A Positive Psychology Intervention for Improved Military Leadership, Unit Cohesion, and Member Well-Being
- Mindfulness Tools to Combat Stress in Military Personnel
- Stress Mindset as an Enabler of Soldier Well-being
- Meaningful Work: What Does It Mean?
- And So to Bed: Sleep, Well-being, and Human Performance
- When Others Have Your Back: Relational Leadership in Balint Style Groups to Enhance Stress Coping Strategies among Armed Forces
- Post Traumatic Growth in Military Personnel
- The Authors
Allister MacIntyre
Foreword
I am very excited and honored to offer a foreword for this volume on positive psychology and mental health. These are undeniably uncertain times for people throughout the world and the uplifting theme of this publication is timely. Although the COVID-19 situation has been improving, we have not fully escaped the grip of this devastating pandemic. The virus continues to mutate with new variations of the disease cropping up on a consistent basis. Furthermore, our collective attention is riveted by disturbing global events and worldwide unrest including political turmoil, humanitarian crises, human rights violations, significant protest activities, natural disasters, climate change, economic woe and recession, terrorist activities, immigration and refugee issues, civil wars, military conflicts, and even full-scale war. This list is by no means exhaustive. Additionally, thanks to the proliferation of access to the internet, the real time dissemination of these crises reaches public awareness at a level unheard of before. Unfortunately, the sources of information on the internet are not always reliable. It is widely known that social media also propagates falsehoods, twisted facts, unsubstantiated conspiracy theories, and outright fear mongering. This profusion of misinformation contributes to widespread heightened stress levels and anxiety. It is safe to assume that, within the military populations of the world, we can expect highly elevated levels of personal tension.
Given that VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity) is a reality on the world stage, it is clear that military forces must regularly grapple with situations where VUCA plays a prominent role, and deals with potentially harmful consequences. It is also a certainty that these serving members must be able to cope effectively with the inevitable stressors associated with these volatile circumstances or suffer significant physical and psychological consequences. It is impressive that 23 international scholars from eight different countries have taken the time to provide well-reasoned and empirically sound guidance on how to best navigate these ubiquitous and pervasive uncertainties while safeguarding their mental and physical health and well-being. Although there are no universal solutions, or silver bullets, the advice presented in the contents of this volume offers hope and wisdom to allow our serving members to emerge victorious despite unreasonable pressures and challenges.
Subjects covered in this publication include the importance of service fitness (Rawat & Deshpande) where the authors not only provide a comprehensive Functional Fitness model, but they also explain how self-awareness, exploration and regulation can contribute to this fitness. Given the theme of this volume, it is no surprise that attention is devoted to related topics. Hence, themes like resilience (Niederhauser & Annen; Toom), psychological health (Giusti & Sherwell), and positive psychology (Bester; Sharma & Kapoor; Wood & Cherif) play a prominent role in the guidance offered. Naturally, the dangers faced by military members are not purely physical and the cognitive role played by our minds is given the attention it deserves (Agarwal; Freeman). Edith Knight focuses on the satisfaction that one can derive from meaningful work, and Martin Jones, along with his colleagues Sophie Wardle and Fiona Koivula, examine restful sleep “as a pillar of well-being and human performance.” No volume on military resilience and well-being would be complete without touching on the role played by leaders. With this in mind, Jürgen Leon and Elena Trentini explore how a relationship leadership approach can help to enhance stress coping strategies in military members. Finally, Verma Swati, Updesh Kumar and Dakshi Walia provide an optimistic view of what might emerge from stressful consequences. They readily acknowledge that it does not matter how much training soldiers receive, they will inevitably experience traumatic situations. However, the consequences of these negative events, is not always devastating. The authors explain that Post Traumatic Growth can occur when the trauma generates positive outcomes. This may sound counter-intuitive but they do explain what this can look like and describe how this growth can take place.
In summary, the world is an uncertain and complex place, filled with volatile and ambiguous situations. Moreover, military members must face these traumatic hardships more frequently than the citizens within their respective nations. However, the message need not be one of doom and gloom. The scholars contributing to this volume have emerged from our global village to provide sage advice on how to meet these adversities with resilience and perhaps even growth. It is clear that various cultures, and geographical boundaries, do not determine the quality of a human’s response to suffering. Nor does it influence well-being, psychological health, resilience and growth. A single volume will never be able to capture every conceivable consequence of trauma, or provide perfect solutions, but the efforts offered by these gifted scholars provide a sense of hope.
Samir Rawat and Abhijit Deshpande
Enhancing Functional Fitness through Self – Regulation Initiatives in the Military: An Indian Perspective
Introduction
Functionally fit1 leaders are likely to be more effective than leaders struggling with personal issues that may interfere with professional competence, critical decision making and genuine care and concern for soldiers under their command. They are those leaders who are not just physically fit, but mentally robust as well with sound psychological health to endure highly stressful and demanding military situations. To always ensure the functional fitness of troops for operational readiness and mission effectiveness, leaders need to be functionally fit and be able to take care of themselves first through the ‘thick and thin of combat.’2 This implies that leaders possess good cognitive abilities and personal awareness along with high self-regulation skills for regular introspection and reflection on one’s own areas of improvement.3
Executive functions4 refer to aspects of cognition that are called for in situations when brain and behavior cannot rely on automatic responses. They describe interrelated cognitive abilities that are activated when one must intentionally or deliberately process and retain information, manage, and integrate this information, and resolve competing or discrepant stimulus representations and response options. In other words, these cognitive abilities are important for military leaders to help them organize information, plan and problem solve. Furthermore, executive functions orchestrate the thoughts and actions necessary for goal-directed behavior that allows for purposeful engagement with the environment, even under conditions of duress. As such, they are aspects of the psychological ability that assists individuals in self-regulation and self-control.
This chapter focuses on self-regulation initiatives including optimal self-care to ensure functional fitness especially in operations that require military leaders to show courage. First, we define concepts related to functional fitness in the military as well as discuss the idea of self-regulation and its importance to military leaders. Second, we discuss the importance of holistic health, which includes physical and mental components like self-care. We argue that self-care provides structure and meaning to one’s personal and professional life, both of which interact, impact, and complement each other. Third, we discuss various dimensions of self–regulation including self-awareness, self–exploration, relaxation, meditation, recreation and self enhancement through such self-exploratory activities as regularly diary writing as well as reading to upgrade one’s knowledge, skills or fine-tune one’s attitudes. Finally, the chapter defines and outlines the importance of intrapersonal self–awareness, interpersonal self-awareness, cultural self-awareness, communication self-awareness, and professional self–awareness.
Functional Fitness in the Military
The Functional Fitness model5 outlines the multidimensional nature of service fitness. The model is comprehensive, integrating psychological and physical fitness dimensions into four psycho-physiological clusters: (a) physically unimpaired with depleted psychological resources; (b) physically impaired with depleted psychological resources; (c) physically impaired without depletion in psychological resources; and (d) physically unimpaired with actual performance boosted due to applied psychological resources. The model suggests that when functional decline occurs, the type of resource depletion should be identified before deciding the most appropriate interventions.
Interestingly, Parmak6 proposed a multidimensional approach model to military health, which argues that functional fitness and health go beyond medical symptoms, and that it is necessary to examine performance restrictions from both a physical and a psychological perspective. In a discussion during WARMCAMP7 2016 and 2017 in India, the first author and Parmak noted that, even for cadets, the masculine and fitness-focused male-oriented military culture may unintentionally trigger a functional decline when cadets choose to inadvertently suppress, ignore or minimize some health issues (for example, a torn ligament) in order to be perceived as strong, fit and capable of passing their mandatory tests. The non-medical Military Demand – Resource model recognizes the role of soldiers’ psychological resources while considering situational demands (e.g., routine military tasks, daily stressors, risks), soldiers’ internal and external resource environment (e.g., leadership, coping mechanism, operational tasks), and outputs (performance, training standards, promotion), all of which mediate situational demands and outcomes. This model has been studied by other researchers89101112 with similar findings.
Self -Regulation and Its Importance to Military Leaders
In this chapter, self-regulation13 is defined as the process of purposefully directing one’s actions, thoughts, and feelings towards a goal; it includes methods and means involved in achieving and sustaining goals, conceptualized as internally represented desired states. At the core of most self-regulation theories14151617 is a feedback loop that starts with individuals setting goals, then comparing their progress against the goals, and finally modifying their behaviors or cognitions to reduce any discrepancy between the goals and the current state. Evidence suggests that leaders who display self-control181920 and monitor and adjust their behavior best respond to the complexity and demands of the environment.
Self-regulation theories212223 suggest that leaders who readily adapt to a variety of organizational requirements and contexts can maximize their effectiveness by putting ‘service before self.’ Self-regulation is what allows leaders to put the organizational interest first and delay their own gratification with respect to desired personal outcomes.2425 Self-regulation can promote trust26 responsibility,27 understanding of others,28 leadership emergence29 as well as cooperation with others.30 Researchers have reported exciting findings about what makes leaders effective,31 including (a) promoting self-awareness among group members, (b) setting clear standards and goals for their team, and (c) motivating team members to reduce the discrepancy between desired and actual performance. Similarly, other researchers32 have identified three essential conditions for successful group regulation: (a) self-awareness, (b) clear standards and goals, and (c) the ability, willingness, and necessary resources to make changes.
Although important features like effort,33 goal-directedness,34 problem- solving35 and persistence36 have been associated with successful leadership, few studies have connected functional fitness with the self-regulation framework of effective leadership.
Details
- Pages
- 286
- Year
- 2023
- ISBN (PDF)
- 9783631894149
- ISBN (ePUB)
- 9783631894156
- ISBN (Hardcover)
- 9783631894132
- DOI
- 10.3726/b20427
- Open Access
- CC-BY
- Language
- English
- Publication date
- 2023 (August)
- Keywords
- VUCA world stress mindfulness mental health well-being
- Published
- Berlin, Bern, Bruxelles, New York, Oxford, Warszawa, Wien, 2023. 286 pp., 9 fig. b/w.
