Background and Objectives Involvement in wartime combat often conveys a number of deleterious outcomes, including posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, hostility aggression, and suicidal ideation. Less studied is the effect of engagement in wartime atrocities, including witnessing and perpetrating abusive violence. Design and Methods This study employed path analysis to examine the direct effects of involvement in wartime atrocities on hostility, aggression, depression, and suicidal ideation independent of combat exposure, as well as the indirect effects via guilt and PTSD symptom severity among 603 help-seeking male Vietnam War veterans. Results Involvement in wartime atrocities was predictive of increased guilt, PTSD severity, hostility, aggression, depressive symptoms, and suicidal ideation after controlling for overall combat exposure. Combat-related guilt played a minor role in mediating the effect of atrocity involvement on depression and suicidal ideation. PTSD severity had a larger mediational effect. However, it still accounted for less than half of the total effect of involvement in wartime atrocities on hostility, aggression, and suicidal ideation. Conclusions These findings highlight the heightened risk conveyed by involvement in wartime atrocities and suggest that the psychological sequelae experienced following atrocity involvement may extend well beyond guilt and PTSD.

Background Men with HIV who have sex with men (MSM) represent the largest group of people living with HIV/AIDS in the United States. It is important to understand the sexual risk-taking behaviours that may be linked to the transmission of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections in this population. Models of HIV risk that focus solely on personal factors have been demonstrated to be ineffective at explaining risk behaviour. Rather, in order to fully understand sexual risk-taking, it is important to examine the factors linked to high-risk sexual situations and not solely the factors linked to potentially high-risk people. Methods A diverse sample of 100 MSM with HIV completed a 6-week internet-based sex diary that collected detailed information on recent sexual encounters. In total, information on over 250 sexual episodes was collected and analysed. Generalised linear mixed models were used to examine situational predictors of risk episodes. Results Analyses revealed that drug use by self and sex partners (examined individually and together) were positively related to risk episodes. Likewise, having a sex partner met online and having a sexual encounter in a sex party or bathhouse setting was linked to risk episodes. Sexual episodes that involved a sex-partner who was perceived as sexually desirable and those involving communication about HIV and/or condom use with partners each were negatively related to risk. Conclusions Situational factors play an important role in explaining sexual risk-taking among MSM with HIV. Researchers should place a greater focus on drug use and characteristics of sex partners and settings in which sexual behaviours occur as situational predictors of risk in order to comprehensively understand sexual risk-taking in this population.

Adverse experiences with patient care in the emergency department during psychiatry residency appear to be linked to professional burnout and threaten to shape long-term plans regarding care for publicly insured patients.