What Does the Term 'Military Family' Mean? - A Comparison Across Four Countries

Abstract: Defining a family is particularly important for military family health research and for the provision of services and benefits. Studies repeatedly stress the importance of family in supporting military personnel throughout their service. However, much of this research adheres to traditional ideals of family structure despite changing social attitudes and potential nuances between the definition and function of ‘family’. In order to ensure military family research is applicable to modern military families, we need a greater understanding of who a modern military family is. The first step in this process is considering how the family as an institution is implicitly and explicitly constructed through the definitions contained within policies relating to military families and the military charity sector. Publicly available definitions of military families described in health, education, and social welfare policies and the charitable sectors of the United Kingdom, United States, Australia and Canada were reviewed.