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Evaluation ViewAttendees 1

Military and Veterans Psychology
Session Type:: Symposia

Symposium 61 - Bridging the Gap between Military Culture and Cognitive Behavioral Psychology Research

Sunday, November 23, 2025
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM CST
Location: Strand 12 A&B, Level 2
CE: 1.5

Keywords: Military, Suicide, Implementation
Level of Familiarity: Basic to Moderate
Recommended Readings: Bryan, C. J., & Morrow, C. E. (2011). Circumventing mental health stigma by embracing the warrior culture: Lessons learned from the Defender's Edge program. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 42(1), 16.,   Stanley, I. H., Embrey, E. P., & Bebarta, V. S. (2024). Actualizing Military Suicide Prevention Through Digital Health Modernization. JAMA psychiatry, 81(12), 1173-1174.,   Bond, A. E., Moceri‐Brooks, J., Bandel, S. L., Crifasi, C., Bryan, C. J., Capron, D. W., ... & Anestis, M. D. (2024). Determining who military service members deem credible to discuss firearm safety for suicide prevention. Suicide and Life‐Threatening Behavior, 54(3), 584-592.,   ,  

Military personnel represent a distinct cultural group whose unique identity and cultural norms significantly influence their engagement with psychological services, symptom presentation, and intervention efficacy. The current symposium integrates novel empirical research and methodological innovations to enhance our understanding of military culture, facilitate more accurate psychological assessments, and optimize cognitive-behavioral interventions within military contexts, directly aligning with the mission of the Association of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT).
The first presentation advances our conceptual understanding of military identity by validating the Warrior Identity Scale (WIS) and examining honor ideology among active-duty soldiers. This research demonstrates that robust assessment of military-specific identity facets, including a felt sense of connection to military values and honor-based beliefs, is vital for understanding mental health outcomes such as depression, suicidal ideation, and firearm ownership attitudes. These findings underscore the significance of integrating culturally-informed measures into clinical practice to enhance both relevance and effectiveness in military populations.
The second presentation addresses crucial challenges of credibility and engagement within military psychological surveys. Utilizing mixed-method analyses, findings from over 3,000 active-duty participants reveal substantial concerns regarding self-reported honesty driven by confidentiality fears, stigma, and survey fatigue. By categorizing respondents based on credibility and engagement, this innovative research identifies methodological improvements that can mitigate biases and enhance the validity of psychological assessments, thus significantly impacting both research integrity and clinical practice.
The third presentation presents a study on Military-to-Civilian Transition Among Veterans Who Experienced Military Sexual Trauma: Considerations for Care.
Lastly, a novel recruitment approach within a National Guard population tested the assumption that emphasizing culturally-valued traits (e.g., fearlessness about death) versus stigmatized conditions (mental health problems) would yield higher engagement from at-risk soldiers. Contrary to initial hypotheses, findings indicated higher engagement with mental health-focused studies, yet those interested in fearlessness displayed higher suicide risk. This highlights the complex interplay between cultural values and psychopathology and suggests strategic avenues for culturally-sensitive interventions designed to initially engage and subsequently retain at-risk military populations.
Collectively, these presentations exemplify a critical and innovative approach to bridging military culture with cognitive behavioral therapy and psychopathology. Through improved assessment techniques, enhanced methodological rigor, and culturally-sensitive recruitment strategies, this symposium advances ABCT’s mission to promote empirically-supported treatments adapted to diverse cultural contexts, significantly impacting the health and readiness of military personnel.

Learning Objectives:

At the end of this session, the learner will be able to:
  1. Enhance cultural competence for CBT therapists working with military personnel.
  2. Improve clinical assessment skills integrating military-specific identity factors.
  3. Reduce stigma barriers in therapy by incorporating culturally-valued traits in assessment methods.
  4. Strengthen clinical skills for designing culturally-sensitive mental health interventions for military populations.

Presentations:

  • 12:06 PM - 12:27 PM CST
    (SYM 61) Using Warrior Culture Recruiting for Online Randomized Controlled Trials of Military Suicide

    Speaker: Daniel Capron, Ph.D. – Louisiana State University

  • 12:27 PM - 12:48 PM CST
    (SYM 61) Can We Handle the Truth?
    understanding Credibility and Engagement in Military Survey Responses

    Speaker: Benjamin Trachik, Ph.D. – RAND Corporation

  • 12:48 PM - 1:09 PM CST
    (SYM 61) Conceptualizing and Assessing Military Identity in Active-duty Service Members: The Importance of Warrior Identity and Honor Ideology

    Speaker: Raymond P. Tucker, Ph.D. – Louisiana State University

  • 1:09 PM - 1:30 PM CST
    (SYM 61) Military-to-civilian Transition Among Veterans Who Experienced Military Sexual Trauma: Considerations for Care

    Speaker: Whitney S. Livingston, Ph.D. – RAND Corporation

    Co-author: Kathryn Bouskill, PhD, MPH – RAND

    Co-author: Elena Younossi, MPH – RAND

    Co-author: Angeles Sedano, MSW – University of Southern California

    Co-author: Liv Canning, MSW – University of Southern California

    Co-author: Carl Castro, PhD – University of southern california

    Co-author: Eric Pedersen, PhD – University of Southern california

    Co-author: Jordan Davis, PhD – RAND