The aim of this study was to compare the wives of Australian soldiers
who had been imprisoned during World War II (POWs) with a control grou
p of non-POWs' wives and also to compare the POWs and non-POWs themsel
ves in respect to several psychological and family life characteristic
s on which differences might be expected to arise from the long-term e
ffects of imprisonment. A random sample of 145 of these veterans and t
heir wives completed several self-administered mood and family life sc
ales, an inventory of somatic symptoms, questions about the impact of
the war on the veteran in the postwar decades, and several social back
ground questions. The POWs themselves were more depressed and reported
more somatic symptoms and a greater postwar impact of the war than th
e non-POWs. However, these differences were not accompanied by concomi
tant differences among their wives. There was some evidence of an infl
uence of the POW's mood on his wife's mood in significant correlations
between husbands' and wives' depression and anxiety scale scores in P
OW couples alone. Otherwise, there was very little indication that the
POW experience had any long-term effect on the marriage relationship
as measured by the variables included in this study.