31 July 2019
- RSIS
- Publication
- External Publications
- Assessing Mental Health Challenges in the People’s Liberation Army, Part 1: Psychological Factors Affecting Service Members, and the Leadership Response
Assessing Mental Health Challenges in the People’s Liberation Army, Part 1: Psychological Factors Affecting Service Members, and the Leadership Response
This is the first part of a two-part article that addresses the efforts of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to deal more effectively with the challenges of mental health, which can have serious impacts on the morale and readiness of individual service members—and therefore, on the combat readiness of the PLA as a whole. Part 1 of this article will provide a summary overview of psychological issues in the PLA as revealed by internal surveys and assessments by Chinese military medical personnel, as well as discussion of the policy responses under consideration by PLA leaders. Part 2 of the article, to appear in our next issue, will provide a more detailed examination of the stresses presented by particular operating environments, and the resulting impacts on the psychological health of service members assigned to those environments.
This is the first part of a two-part article that addresses the efforts of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to deal more effectively with the challenges of mental health, which can have serious impacts on the morale and readiness of individual service members—and therefore, on the combat readiness of the PLA as a whole. Part 1 of this article will provide a summary overview of psychological issues in the PLA as revealed by internal surveys and assessments by Chinese military medical personnel, as well as discussion of the policy responses under consideration by PLA leaders. Part 2 of the article, to appear in our next issue, will provide a more detailed examination of the stresses presented by particular operating environments, and the resulting impacts on the psychological health of service members assigned to those environments.
