Deployment Risk and Resilience Inventory‐2 (DRRI‐2): An Updated Tool for Assessing Psychosocial Risk and Resilience Factors Among Service Members and Veterans

Abstract

The Deployment Risk and Resilience Inventory (DRRI) is a widely used instrument for assessing deployment-related risk and resilience factors among war veterans. A revision of this instrument was recently undertaken to enhance the DRRI’s applicability across a variety of deployment-related circumstances and military subgroups. The resulting suite of 17 distinct DRRI-2 scales is the product of a multiyear psychometric endeavor that involved (a) focus groups with Operation Enduring Freedom/Operation Iraqi Freedom (OEF/OIF) veterans to inform an assessment of the content validity of original DRRI measures, (b) examination of item and scale characteristics of revised scales in a national sample of 469 OEF/OIF veterans, and (c) administration of refined scales to a second national sample of 1,046 OEF/OIF veterans to confirm their psychometric quality. Both classical test theory and item response theory analytical strategies were applied to inform major revisions, which included updating the coverage of warfare-related stressors, expanding the assessment of family factors throughout the deployment cycle, and shortening scales. Finalized DRRI-2 scales demonstrated strong internal consistency reliability and criterion-related validity. The DRRI-2 can be applied to examine the role that psychosocial factors play in post deployment health and inform interventions aimed at reducing risk and enhancing resilience among war veterans.

The critical warzone experiences (CWE) scale: Initial psychometric properties and association with PTSD, anxiety, and depression

“…Similar concerns can be raised in relation to the Deployment Risk and Resilience Inventory (DRRI; King, King, Vogt, Knight, & Sampler, 2006) and the more recently published Deployment Risk and Resilience Inventory-2 (DRRI-2; Vogt et al, 2013). A clear advantage of the DRRI/DRRI-2 measures is that they have been developed in a systematic fashion and have been validated with Iraq and Afghanistan veterans; however, like the MHAT-CES, the two key DRRI/DRRI-2 scales assessing critical warzone experiences, the Combat …”

2015 Department of Defense Health Related Behaviors Survey (HRBS)

“…Eighteen subitems asked about exposure to various combat situations during deployment-for example, "I encountered mines, booby traps, or improvised explosive devices (IEDs)"; "I saw dead bodies or human remains"; and "I interacted with enemy prisoners of war." This combat exposure index is a composite of several existing combat exposure scales, including a seven-item scale used by the VA (National Center for PTSD, 2016a; Hoge, Castro, et al, 2004;Keane et al, 1989) and the 17-item Deployment Risk and Resilience Inventory (National Center for PTSD, 2016b; Vogt et al, 2013). Response options were provided on a 5-point scale (0-4), ranging from "never (0)" to "more than 50 times (4)," and a sum score was created for each item (possible range of 0 to 72) (see Appendix D for further detail).…”

Perceived danger during deployment: a Rasch validation of an instrument assessing perceived combat exposure and the witnessing of combat consequences in a war zone

“…The items directly related to exposure are to some extent similar to those in the widely used combat exposure scale (Keane et al, 1989) measuring only the dimension ‘combat experiences’. However, the distinction in DI between perceived exposure to combat and witnessing the consequences of war is more in line with another well-known self-reported combat exposure scale namely the Deployment Risk and Resilience Inventory (DRRI-2), with a distinction between combat experiences (perceived threat, perceived exposure) and post-battle experiences (King, King, Knight, & Samper, 2006; Vogt et al, 2013). Perceived DI was expressed as a total sum score, and thus based on an assumption of unidimensionality.…”

“…have high semantic overlap with items in other known combat exposure scales (Keane et al, 1989). The same is the case for items such as seeing wounded people, seeing dead people and witnessing distress among the locals , which have a high semantic overlap with items from, for example, the Aftermath of Battle -subscale of the DRRI/DRRI-2 (Vogt et al, 2013). All items in the DI scale (Berntsen et al, 2012) had four response categories (1 = never, 2 = seldom, 3 = fairly often, 4 = almost daily).…”