Personality and mental health: How related are they within the military context?


Suemer H. C., Suemer N.

MILITARY PSYCHOLOGY, vol.19, no.3, pp.161-174, 2007 (SSCI) identifier identifier

  • Publication Type: Article / Article
  • Volume: 19 Issue: 3
  • Publication Date: 2007
  • Doi Number: 10.1080/08995600701386325
  • Journal Name: MILITARY PSYCHOLOGY
  • Journal Indexes: Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), Scopus
  • Page Numbers: pp.161-174
  • Middle East Technical University Affiliated: No

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to examine the nature of the relationships between job-specific personality dimensions and psychological well-being for officers in the Turkish Armed Forces (TAF). Turkish Armed Forces Personality Inventory (TAFPI) is a 19-dimension measure of personality used in officer selection in the TAR In our previous research, four latent factors had been identified as underlying the TAFPI dimensions: Military Factor, Leadership, Conscientiousness, and Extraversion-Agreeableness. In the present study, the nature of the relationships between the TAFPI dimensions and the latent factor underlying a commonly used psychological screening test, the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI; Derogatis, 1992), was examined on a sample of officers (N = 1111). Specifically, the 19 dimensions of the TAFPI first predicted a latent military personality factor, which, in turn, predicted the latent mental health factor. Results suggested that although the personality latent was predictive of the mental health factor, the amount of variance unexplained in mental health suggested that mental health assessment should not be dispensed in the presence of personality assessment in the selection of officers in the TAR