Nearly 400 spouses of enlisted soldiers who had deployed to Somalia as part of Operation Restore Hope in late 1992 and early 1993 were surveyed in July/August 1993. Their reported post-deployment and retrospective pre-deployment marital satisfaction was predicted as a function of four potentially stressful events or conditions: experiencing a pregnancy during deployment, experiencing loneliness, experiencing the death of a close friend or relative, and/or having problems communicating with one's spouse. Pre-deployment marital stability was used as a control variable. Results from multivariate analyses of variance suggest that the effects of various difficulties during a brief deployment are less stressful, at least in terms of their impact on marital satisfaction, than is often assumed, even for marriages that might be considered "at risk" in terms of low marital stability.

Data from 1,285 recently married soldiers who participated in the 1989 Army Family Research Program survey indicated that premarital counseling by itself had little effect on subsequent marital satisfaction. However, those who had premarital counseling were more likely to use marital and family therapy services, at both subclinical and clinical levels of distress, than others who had not had such counseling before marriage.