Character Strengths of Junior Australian Army Officers.

INTRODUCTION: Armed forces view their officers' character as foundational to their ability to lead the personnel entrusted to them. The character of junior officers is of particular interest, because they must increasingly make quick, morally-laden decisions while dispersed among civilians without time to consult their commanders. However, little is systematically known about the character of officers. Accordingly, the present study was aimed at mapping Australian Army junior officers' perceptions of the chief aspects of their own character and also those of their main role models, specifically, their senior officers, including their trustworthiness as an essential aspect of effective leadership. The present study also tested whether these character perceptions were aligned with four core values of the Australian Army - courage, initiative, teamwork, and respect - which are intended to shape the character of its personnel. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The respondents (N = 171 lieutenants) ranked how well each of 24 positive character strengths applied to themselves as individuals. To test the alignment of these rankings with the respondents' perception of their leaders' character, respondents nominated the five top strengths of their effective leaders. This study was approved by the Australian Defence Human Research Ethics Committee (ADHREC 009-2013). RESULTS: With regard to the first aim, five character strengths - integrity, leadership, good judgment, trustworthy, and teamworker - were ranked by the respondents as being their chief personal strengths at frequencies significantly above those expected from random allocation.With regard to the second aim, the respondents aligned the rankings of their character strengths with those of their effective leaders through the entire list, not just the highest-ranking items. Nevertheless, there were two significant differences. The respondents assigned their leaders higher ranks for wisdom than for themselves, but assigned lower ranks to their leaders for being trustworthy.With regard to the third aim, the respondents' perceptions of their chief character strengths were not well aligned with the four core values of the Australian Army. Teamworker was given a significant top ranking, but courage, initiative, and respectful were not. Thus, the respondents did not appear to respond according to organizational demand characteristics. CONCLUSIONS: The present study achieved its aims. First, it revealed five character strengths that junior officers in the Australian Army tended to see as their own chief strengths. Second, the junior officers saw their character strengths as aligned with those of their senior officers. By and large, this alignment extended across all the character strengths, regardless of their specific ranking. Subject to further experimental testing, this finding provides correlational evidence that junior officers may model their character on what they see in their senior officers. Third, in contrast, the junior officers' rankings were not well aligned with the Australian Army's stated core values. The junior officers saw teamworker as one of their chief strengths, but not courage, initiative, or respectful. This pattern does not imply that the junior officers rejected strengths as valuable but only that they are not among the junior officers' own chief strengths.

The Character Strengths of Special Forces Personnel: Insights for Civilian Health Care Practitioners.

Civilian employees, contractors, and private community clinicians are increasingly providing health treatment to currently serving and former military personnel. This study addresses recent calls for evidence-based information to assist civilian practitioners in understanding the perspectives of their military clients. To this end, the self-reported character strengths of military personnel were elicited as an operationalized expression of their underlying personal values that shape their perspectives and conduct as soldiers. Specifically, Australian Army Special Forces operators and support personnel (N = 337) were asked to rank themselves on 24 character strengths. The three character strengths of integrity, teamworker, and good judgment were ranked significantly above random assignment. Nearly all the respondents (84%) gave a top rank to at least one of these character strengths. Differences between the operators and support personnel were modest. Results are discussed with respect to establishing an effective relationship between military clients and civilian health care practitioners.

Character Strengths and Hardiness of Australian Army Special Forces Applicants.

Australian Army Special Forces (SF) applicants (N = 95) were asked to rank themselves on 24 character strengths at the start of the selection process. Across all applicants, the character strength of integrity was most frequently assigned a top-four rank (45%), followed by team worker (41%), persistence (36%), and love of learning (25%). Successful applicants assigned a top-four rank to team worker significantly more often than unsuccessful applicants (65% versus 32%). The likelihood of passing when team worker was highly ranked (37.5%) was 2.6 times greater than without team worker listed in the top ranks (14.3%). Self-ratings of hardiness revealed no discernible differences between successful and unsuccessful applicants, either alone or in combination with the team worker rankings. These results were largely consistent with the results of a previous study with a cohort of applicants for a different Australian SF unit. Results are discussed with respect to their implications for enhancing the assessment of SF applicants.

A prospective study of character strengths as predictors of selection into the Australian army special force.

For entry into the Australian Army Special Forces (SF), applicants undergo a barrage of strenuous physical and psychological assessments. Despite this screening, subsequent attrition rates in the first weeks of initial selection courses are typically high, and entry testing results have had limited success for predicting who will complete these courses. An SF applicant's character is often thought to be a decisive factor; however, this claim has remained untested. Accordingly, SF applicants (N = 115) were asked to rank themselves on 24 character strengths at the start of the selection process. Successful applicants (n =18) assigned their top ranks to team worker (72%), integrity (67%), and persistence (50%). Applicants (n = 31) who did not include any of those three strengths in their top ranks all failed to complete the selection process. In contrast, successful versus unsuccessful applicants did not discernibly differ on physical assessments and a written test. Results are discussed with respect to their implications for enhancing the assessment of SF applicants.