A Study of PTSD: helping raise awareness

[alethea]

Hello everyone! First of all, this is Alethea.

1) your willingness to participate in this study is entirely voluntary and 2) you may post under DEARSOS if you do not want me or anyone else to see your name or the information in this study.

To give you guys a little background, I'm a pre-med student. I've done a great deal of psychological research, largely centered around studies of the emotional effects of valenced supraliminal stimuli on various emotional centers of the brain. I have also assisted in studies of emotional psychological analysis (and OCEANS) and in recall and affective music.

I want to add a bit more information: I understand that this is a public site and so people of course are nervous about providing their information towards anything that may not be legit. Allow me to give you some greater background.

My name is Diana Rempel. I attend Bethel College and the University of Northern Colorado, working at both institutions to obtain my degree in biomedicine and in English.

My primary reason for interest in PTSD is my own first hand experience with the condition. My boyfriend is in the army. Further, I have three other friends in the military who have been deployed. Two of them suffer from severe cases of PTSD.

My interest is in raising awareness about this condition to demonstrate the magnitude at which it affects people all across this country. I think that in the case of this most recent conflict, awareness is not as high as it should be.

It is also in my highest interest to raise awareness of PTSD within the medical community. There are not, surprisingly, many studies out there exploring the spread of PTSD.

And that is exactly what I'm study; the spread of PTSD, not the severity of individual cases (and I want to make that perfectly clear).

I will not be publishing this study, but it will be reviewed by faculty in the psychology/statistical department of Bethel College.

It is entirely reasonable to be protective of each other, I think I know that I certainly am protective of those women who have come together with me for support, being a part of a military network.

My e-mail is diana.remp@gmail.com, and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have regarding this study or the anonymity therein.

I am not seeking to publish this study. This study is to be used, however, to raise awareness about PTSD and combat-stress related symptoms present in our service members. Regardless of whether or not you post as DEARSOS or under your own name, I will not, under any circumstances, release or integrate or associate you or your family with the information provided in any way. You will be kept ENTIRELY and strictly anonymous.


Again, participation in this is completely voluntary. If you decide to participate in this study, then you will be kept entirely anonymous.

I'm doing a study on PTSD or combat stress-related affects as observed by military SOs (aka, you ladies). For you to participate in this study, you must have an SO (husband, boyfriend, girlfriend, fiance, etc), who has been deployed at least once within the time period of 1980 to the present.

My idea is to help raise awareness of combat-related stress. I'm taking the approach of talking to the SOs of those in the military because often, PTSD is first recognized by family members/loved ones rather than by the individual themselves.

The question is this: With what branch is your SO affiliated? With which (if any) branch are you affiliated? Has your SO experienced PTSD or combat stress-related symptoms due to his/her deployment? If you have been deployed, have you experienced stress-related or PTSD symptoms?

This study may take a while to process, but I am hoping to collect a complete data set within the next few days. Of course, at the end of the study, anyone interested in knowing the overall results (again, all of which will be presented only by branch and numerically; no names) who has participated in this study is welcome to PM me and let me know that they would like to know the results. I will take the time to work through any/all of your questions regarding process and analysis.

Thank you! Your participation is appreciated.

(PS: I posted this under DEARSOS...or submitted it for that posting, rather, but then I thought, well you can post under other forums using DEARSOS, right? Or am I not right on that...anyway, I'm not intentionally spamming, I SWEAR! And um...if I'm crazy and...yeah. Admins, if I'm in the wrong forum, or if one forums is better than the other, please let me know. Knamean?)

[alethea]

[alethea]

yet again *bump*

I know that this is a sensitive subject. I don't want to make anyone feel uncomfortable with this; the idea is not to make the issue seem smaller or to lessen the value of each individual's experience.

[amazinggrace]

Praise the Lord,we not had to deal with this yet....you may want to post under the PTSD forum (under the deployment section)...Good Luck, anything to help raise awareness is great

[alethea]

good point...
*pokes admins* Hey adminys...can this be deleted?

[amazinggrace]

All you have to do to move it is report the post(click on the little caution sign by your on link) and ask them to move it

[Becca]

No I won't delete it, I'll just move it to the right place