Armed Forces & Society

Disputatio Sine Fine Volume 33 Number 2

January 2007 286-295
© 2007 Inter-University
The Essence of Military Seminar on Armed Forces and
Society. All rights reserved.

Group Cohesion 10.1177/0095327X06294173

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hosted at
http://online.sagepub.com
Guy L. Siebold
U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences

In July 2006, Armed Forces & Society published an article by Anthony King, “The
Word of Command: Communication and Cohesion in the Military.” This commentary
takes exception to certain statements and conclusions in King’s article, and in the
process, sketches a standard model of military group cohesion. This model is based on
social integration in the military and is composed of both primary group cohesion (peer
and leader bonding) and secondary group cohesion (organizational and institutional
bonding). The essence of peer bonding is given as social relationships based on trust
and teamwork. The standard model is presented as a tool to sensitize ethnographers
about what to look for when observing military interactions and to help them interpret
what they see.

Keywords: military cohesion; primary groups; peer bonding; trust; teamwork

T he purpose of this commentary is to provide a sketch of what, I believe, is a stan-

dard model of military group cohesion, and in that context, to address certain
statements and conclusions that seem to me to be inaccurate or misleading in a
recent interesting article by King appearing in Armed Forces & Society.1 King’s arti-
cle appears to challenge the standard model but in fact is built on a straw man and
seems to confuse coordinated joint lines of action with cohesion. Cohesion is, in
part, both a facilitator and an outcome of the coordination of joint lines of action but
is not itself such coordination.
Since the early 1980s, researchers at or associated with the United States Army
Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences, the Walter Reed Army
Institute of Research, and related organizations have, off and on, carried out program-
matic research on cohesion.2 They have addressed what is cohesion, how to measure
it, at what level to measure it, how cohesion is developed, how it increases or decreases
over time, how cohesion is distinct from similar variables, what are the benefits or con-
sequences of high or low cohesion (e.g., in terms of increased performance, stress
resistance, and service member retention), and how to design a personnel system to

Editor’s Note: In the July, 2006 issue of Armed Forces & Society, Anthony King contributed “The Word
of Command: Communication and Cohesion in the Military.” In this Disputatio Sine Fine response, Guy
Siebold takes issue with King's model of group cohesion and his conclusions. Look for King's response
in a future issue.

286

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 Siebold / Military Group Cohesion 287

enhance cohesion. While most of the data were collected on combat units, noncombat
and basic training units were also examined, along with military staffs.
The approach used to investigate the construct of cohesion is often the result of
the academic training of the researcher or researchers involved.3 Thus, psychologists
are prone to look at individual identity and attraction to the group, while social psy-
chologists tend to look at group interaction and bonding. Sociologists might focus
on group structure, networks, and fill of personnel, for example, to determine if a
group is sufficiently cohesive to be combat capable after the loss of a certain per-
centage of personnel or key leaders. Some of the ethnography by anthropologists has
described the interactions among service members, group rituals, and bonding.
Political scientists, on the other hand, are more likely to look at the bonding between
service personnel and their military service and the integration of military personnel,
especially high-level leaders, with the wider society or high government officials.
All these approaches can yield valuable contributions to the study of cohesion.
Nonetheless, I believe the most fruitful and common approach to cohesion is that of
the social psychological, as in the standard model, with its focus on bonding among
group members and with their organization and military service, which is generally
applicable to most military groups and forms.

The Standard Model

Cohesion Components
The proffered standard model of military group cohesion consists of four related,
interacting components based on different structural relationships: peer (horizontal),
leader (vertical), organizational, and institutional bonding. Peer or horizontal bonding is
among members at the same military hierarchical level (e.g., squad or group members).
Leader or vertical bonding is between those at different levels (e.g., between squad
or group members and their leaders). Peer and leader bonding within a small group
(e.g., a platoon) together compose primary group cohesion. Organizational bonding is
between personnel and their next higher organizations (e.g., company and battalion),
and institutional bonding is between personnel and their military branch (e.g., the
Army). Together, organizational and institutional bonding compose secondary group
cohesion. Each type of bonding has been considered to have two aspects: affective (an
emotional/reactive side) and instrumental (an action/proactive side). The basics of
primary group cohesion were presented two decades ago and were derived from per-
sonal military experience, previous scientific and ethnographic publications, hundreds
of interviews, and responses from thousands of questionnaires.4 The concept of sec-
ondary group cohesion is of more recent origin but is an extension of research on
primary group cohesion.5 Generally in the military, the bonding process over time starts
with institutional bonding (before entry), then leader bonding (at the start of basic train-
ing) and peer bonding within a stable group, and finally, organizational bonding as a

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288 Armed Forces & Society

service member’s social horizon expands. Primary group cohesion generates the fighter
while secondary group cohesion creates the professional service member.

Definitions
By bonding, I refer to the social relationship, both affective and instrumental, of
changeable strength (weak to strong) between service members and their group,
organization, and service institution. The locus of bonding is in the relationship, not
in the actions or interactions between the service member and the group, organiza-
tion, or institution, although such actions or interactions are influenced by and feed
back into the relationship. Social relationships can be looked at from an individual-
service-member level of analysis or from a group level of analysis. Social relation-
ships are supported by internal and external factors of social control (e.g., law,
regulation, doctrine, norms, habits, and socialization) that stabilize relationship pat-
terns and provide a sense outside and above a person that there is something more
than just a collection of individuals.
Cohesion has been defined in many ways over time.6 The essence of strong
primary group cohesion, which I believe to be generally agreed on, is trust among
group members (e.g., to watch each other’s back) together with the capacity for
teamwork (e.g., pulling together to get the task or job done). The essence of strong
secondary group cohesion resides in the trustworthiness of the organization or insti-
tution together with social exchange with the service member. These definitions do
not deny that there are formal and informal groups and leaders that may influence
different tasks or situations, that there are unevenly impactful values, norms, and
formal and informal rules, or that interactions and meanings are socially constructed,
fluid, and not always based on a consensus. Nonetheless, the bonding at the four
levels can be measured at a point in time or over time, and their patterns can be used
to understand the phenomenon of military group cohesion and predict important out-
comes. For example, primary group cohesion, with some organizational bonding, is
most associated with performance, while secondary group cohesion, especially insti-
tutional bonding, is most associated with the degree of attrition, retention, behavioral
problems, and attitudes toward military service.7
On a theoretical basis, I view military unit cohesion as an ongoing process of
social integration among the members of a primary group, with group leaders, and
with the larger secondary organizations to which they belong. Such a view places
cohesion within a larger perspective and allows for important connections (e.g., with
attrition, adjustment to the military, retention, and performance) and for processes to
be more easily identified and clarified. Cohesion is not an entity or thing, nor is it
easily recognized or its level readily agreed on by knowledgeable military observers.8
Rather, cohesion, in its horizontal, vertical, organizational, and institutional components,

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 Siebold / Military Group Cohesion 289

is a social-relationship product or form generated by the interactions and experiences

of the group members in the context of their daily military activities, combat and
noncombat.

Primary Group Cohesion

The primary group in military service is usually a squad- to platoon-size unit that
is typified by cooperative, holistic, supportive, face-to-face relationships involving
particularistic criteria and that extend over time. The social relationships involved in
peer group and vertical bonding are based on direct personal interactions in rela-
tively closed networks. The group members know each other not just by name, face,
and role but as individuals with a history, personality, and attributes beyond those of
the position they occupy. Combat group members try to develop strong bonding as
a collective good, at least in part, because it is in their own self-interest for survival
to do so.9 Social control is especially based on norms and habits, with expectations
of loyalty and ready assistance to other members of the primary group. Peer bond-
ing relates to the establishment and maintenance of within-stratum social relation-
ships in the primary group, whereas leader bonding pertains to the between-stratum
social relationships in the primary group.

Secondary Group Cohesion

Organizational bonding. For most service members, the immediate secondary
group above the primary group is usually represented by the company, somewhat by
the battalion level, and to a lesser degree, by the brigade or regimental level. Service
members know people in the immediate secondary group typically by name and face
but not necessarily in much depth beyond the role or position a person occupies. The
interactions with those in the secondary group tend to be intermittent and structured.
Rather than being holistic and particular, the relationships mostly revolve around
specific roles, focus on the business at hand, and involve universal criteria. Similarly,
social control tends to be more formal and based on regulation, law, reward, and pun-
ishment. Over time in a relatively stabilized unit, the social horizon (i.e., knowledge
and perspective) of a squad member extends beyond the primary group further into
the higher and wider levels of the immediate secondary group. Within the secondary
group, interactions are often indirect and in relatively open networks; the interac-
tions are likely to be controlled by social-exchange norms and trustworthiness.10
The immediate secondary group provides a sense of purpose and meaningfulness
by delineating specific missions, directions, and information, including scheduling
prioritized activities and assigning the resources to carry them out. This level also
sets the unit culture and climate under which service members live and operate while
on, and to a lesser degree, off duty. As the primary group operates to prevent anomie

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290 Armed Forces & Society

or normlessness, the secondary group operates to prevent ennui or meaninglessness.

The immediate secondary group provides the service members with housing, food,
access to medical treatment, equipment, and supplies as well as a recognizable unit
in which they can have pride and with which they can identify. The organizational
bonding is based on formal and informal relationships that tend to be more imper-
sonal and based on organizational goals and exchanges. Organizational bonding
occurs to the extent that there is a formal or informal exchange between the service
members and the larger unit or secondary organization (i.e., service member effort,
loyalty, commitment, and task performance are traded for resources, training, a sense
of purpose, and a supportive climate).

Institutional bonding. Institutional bonding relates to the social integration of

service members with the larger military institution (e.g., the Army) to which the
primary and organizational-level groupings belong.11 The larger institution for a ser-
vice member has at its center typically a military service such as the Army and a
wider military complex linked with that center. The institutional level is the largest
meaningful military context for most service members. The institution represents a
relatively stable structure of specialized positions, roles, groups, organizations, and
social operations that carry out the major social function of national defense. The
institution provides a general sense of purpose and meaningfulness that is linked to
the larger (usually national) society and culture. This institutional level sets the gen-
eral conditions under which the immediate secondary groups, primary groups, and
service members live and function. The institution provides the service members
with structures for pay and benefits, training progression, career patterns, and gen-
eral standards of behavior besides allotting the funding and other resources to lower
level groups. Institutional bonding or cohesion occurs to the extent that there is a
dependable exchange between the service members and the institution (i.e., service
member effort, loyalty, and continuous performance are traded for a sense of ele-
vated purpose, compensation, systemic training opportunities, career progression, and
socially approved support for values, roles, careers, and way of life).

A Challenge to the Standard Model

In his ethnography about communication and cohesion in the British military,

King12 starts out by noting that the military depends on strong social cohesion and
that social scientists have sought to explain the processes that produce that high level
of cohesion. Along this vein, King, in his Method section, identifies his research
issue: “this article seeks to illustrate the sociological processes by which social cohe-
sion is created and sustained.”13 I take this to mean social processes and support this
as a worthy issue. Nonetheless, King’s research issue is left ambiguous by his not
addressing explicitly what he means by social cohesion but rather taking the

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 Siebold / Military Group Cohesion 291

construct as a nonproblematic given. Furthermore, King does not identify his applic-
able population (e.g., just troop leaders or small combat units or noncombat units as
well) or applicable situations (e.g., just combat or combat-like training or including
garrison and noncombat work environments).
King begins his presentation by creating a straw man to demolish. First, he
reviews the classic Shils and Janowitz article14 that asserts that the German forces
near the end of World War II held together because of the strength of their primary
groups. Next, King states that while the importance of primary groups has been reaf-
firmed by subsequent literature, the later researchers tended to focus exclusively on
the personal and intimate relations within primary groups. This assertion then allows
King to set up his conclusion that “military sociology has generally explained social
cohesion in the armed forces by reference to the intimate personal bonds produced
in informal rituals.”15
While it is true that a few researchers have focused on intimate personal bonds
and informal rituals, I submit that the majority of researchers (here, I include soci-
ologists, anthropologists, and psychologists) have used some form or part of the
standard model in their approach, especially during the past twenty years, which
does not dwell on intimate relations or masculine rituals but rather emphasizes inter-
personal trust and teamwork built through many experiences including arduous
training and drills. Furthermore, while I recognize that some of the military litera-
ture may require extra effort to obtain, there are a sufficient number of readily avail-
able publications to access the work of military researchers on cohesion that
incorporates, to an extent, the standard model. Thus, King’s conclusion about research
explanations of military cohesion via informal rituals is off base and seems attrib-
uted to only taking into account a segment of the relevant literature.
King acknowledges the importance of part of the standard model when he states
that “primary groups are manifestly critical to military performance: it is vital that
soldiers know each other if they are to cohere under the pressure of combat. Soldiers
must be able to trust their colleagues, knowing how they will conduct themselves
under fire.”16 Then, he presents anomalous examples that seem to defy the (straw
man) concept of cohesion that is based on personal and intimate friendship. But
these examples do not really go against the standard model. In one case, King
describes two units with antipathy toward one another who engaged in a shipboard
brawl on their way to combat. Yet, they worked well together in combat, providing
a good deal of mutual assistance. This example appears merely to be a case in which
two groups with much commonality in culture, mission, secondary group bonding,
and self-interest banded together to fight a common outside enemy. In other cases,
King notes that a British battalion in World War I and the Argentine military in the
Falkland Islands conflict appeared to have a higher degree of friendship than their
opponents but did not perform well in combat. These are not counterexamples. For
one, primary group cohesion is only one component of military performance.
Military skill, weapon systems, collective training, doctrine, and other factors affect
performance. The comparison should be the importance of high or low cohesion in

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292 Armed Forces & Society

the context of all these other factors or with these factors held constant. Second,
mere friendship or comradeship is not the essence of cohesion, as noted in the stan-
dard model. King concludes by these alleged counterexamples that the basis of cohe-
sion leading to effective performance is not located primarily in personal relations
and informal rituals but is located in formal rituals such as collective drills.17
This conclusion leads King to his examination of communication during battle
drills. In his Research Focus section, he describes what appears to be his ethno-
graphic working hypothesis—“to maintain group cohesion, communication between
soldiers is critical for it coordinates their actions.”18 I find this conjoint, packed
phrasing partially problematic because it assumes a pre-existing, static group cohe-
sion that does not affect communications or group actions and implies that coordi-
nated group actions are the locus of group cohesion rather than a partial result of
cohesion and something that feeds back into group cohesion. Just as researchers, I
believe, took a wrong turn when they used the small-group roles of socioemotional
leader and task leader to identify cohesion as either social or task cohesion rather
than being a relationship structure, I feel that it is a wrong turn to try to locate cohe-
sion in temporal coordinated action itself.
Imagine a young basketball player learning to dribble a basketball, then learning
to dribble while running down the court, then learning to move down court dribbling
and passing the ball back and forth to a teammate. Each of these actions is more
complex than the previous. Eventually, the player learns to combine these and other
actions with his or her teammates in a basketball play, an action package, with vari-
ations. By the time the player is working on several basketball plays with options,
the earlier individual skill actions of dribbling, dribbling while running, and passing
are second nature, just basic actions, which are part of the background in the action
packages in game sequences. The minds of the players are no longer on the basic
actions such as dribbling, but on the ever larger, more complicated action packages
with labels. Likewise, in battle drills and rehearsals, the smaller actions such as indi-
vidual movement, positioning, and communication are already or being learned.
The training focus is on larger action packages such as movement to contact, raid,
or assault so that the service members and small groups can coordinate and syn-
chronize their joint lines of action by movements, commands, and other means. It is
group cohesion that can foster this learning process, and the degree of success of the
group’s coordinated performance can demonstrate the value of the group, its trust-
worthiness, and how worthwhile the investment in it will be, which in turn influence
the structure of social relationships in primary group bonding.
King identifies three kinds of communication drills: collective representations,
collective movements, and commands on contact.19 While I find his description of
communication in the British Army battle drills to be informative, I think that his
analysis that equates battle drills to quasi-religious rituals is overly romanticized.
Certainly, drills create shared understandings and expectations, but their purpose is
to develop patterned behavioral responses and habits for standard missions (action
packages) such as attack and hasty defense, which can be developed in more detail

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 Siebold / Military Group Cohesion 293

in the context of specific missions. Likewise, heuristic terrain scale models are use-
ful conceptual tools for planning and preparing for an operation in which the syn-
chronization of action and clarification of roles and responsibilities are especially
needed. However, to analogize the use of models and mock-ups for military opera-
tional planning to annual religious rituals of aborigines goes too far. For example,
aborigine religious artifacts or totems are, as King noted, considered sacred. For mod-
els for military planning, a rock, bottle cap, or any object can be used to stand for
any particular terrain feature or group and will be readily discarded after a model is
no longer being used, indicating the objects are not at all sacred. These are symbols
but not totems. Certainly, unit flags, insignia, and emblems are symbols that stand
for the group and may be analogous to totems, and unit parades, transfer of command
events, and other ceremonies and formations are group-centered rituals. Nonetheless,
battle drills and similar training are used to clarify roles and responsibilities and build
synchronized joint lines of action among individuals and groups rather than reify the
group or unit or their relationship structures. They help diagnose group weaknesses
and areas needing improvement or special attention.
King puts much emphasis on shared collective goals and the part of battle drills,
terrain models, and communication in promoting those goals, which they undoubt-
edly do to some extent. Nevertheless, King does not identify what these collective
goals are or treat them as problematic matters. For example, there is not necessarily
full acceptance of the goals by all members of the group, there may be directly con-
flicting goals, and there may be layers of goals that are not all in harmony with one
another. Furthermore, King does not raise the critical issue of the normative restraint
on goals, especially in highly cohesive groups, or the possibility of combat refusals
that may occur if peer bonding is strong and bonding with leaders is poor. Similarly,
poor performers (“slugs” or “bad apples”) do exist, as do deviants, despite the efforts
of scrutinized training drills to get them on the same sheet of music as others in the
group. Some degree of cohesion exists before training or a mission rehearsal. This
cohesion influences the acceptance of collective goals and unit performance and is,
in turn, influenced by them. Likewise, cultural knowledge about roles and responsi-
bilities, doctrine, missions, and other relevant information that a leader possesses
before training or actual mission can allow the leader, without communication or
corporal coordination developed in unit battle drills or rehearsals, to coordinate joint
lines of action with units the leader never worked with before, based on secondary
group cohesion.20 In short, to state that the social cohesion of primary groups is pri-
marily a product of repeated training rituals is overreaching.21
King presents another straw man in suggesting that a potentially radical rethink-
ing of comradeship may be necessary. He alleges that military sociologists think that
personal bonding is a prerequisite to effective performance but asserts that bonds of
friendship may grow out of military proficiency and performance.22 King’s assertion
is an overgeneralization. Comradeship and group status (positive or negative) can
come from many sources including high (or low) military skill and performance, are

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294 Armed Forces & Society

very situation dependent, and are ongoing and changeable over time. As noted ear-
lier, many factors go into successful performance; bonds between group members
should help performance but are not outcome determinative.23 Furthermore, it is well
known that in small groups, those who best embody the group’s purpose and values
usually attain the highest status and are most selected as comrades for group and
even nongroup activities.
The standard model is a potentially useful ethnographic tool that can sensitize
observers about what to look for and help them interpret what they see. For example,
in viewing a tactical field-exercise planning session among (within stratum) junior
officers, does one of the officers demonstrate a need for dominance, how do the others
react to the attempted dominance (e.g., ignoring the person or using normative social
control), how does this affect their relationships and subsequent action in the field,
and how does the field action in return affect their cohesion? If normative social con-
trol is weak, does this show up in a reduced coordination of actions? Likewise, are
training events set up to meet standards, a potentially win-win situation, or as com-
petitions, a win-lose condition? King cites one instance in which a young officer’s
group performed badly on a contact drill, which King interpreted as a result of poor
communication that resulted in group members’ not knowing what was required at
decisive situations.24 This interpretation may be correct. However, no alternate or sup-
plemental explanations seemed to be sought. Consideration of the standard model
may have suggested there was more going on than lack of clear commands.
While King’s and some other recent Armed Forces & Society articles25 make a pos-
itive contribution to the literature generally, they are additionally important in that they
bring a renewed emphasis to the interplay between social structure, military culture, and
human action. Such an emphasis not only can promote greater knowledge about the
armed forces but can provide stronger links with the wider social sciences. Hopefully,
similar new articles that contribute to both the military and general social science liter-
ature will continue to be submitted to and appear in Armed Forces & Society.

Notes
1. A. King, “The Word of Command: Communication and Cohesion in the Military,” Armed Forces
& Society 32, 4 (July 2006): 493–512.
2. See, for example, M. D. Smith and J. D. Hagman, Year 1 Assessment of the Unit Focused Stability
Manning System, Technical Report 1150 (Arlington, VA: U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral
and Social Sciences, 2004)(DTIC no. ADA 428049); and M. A. Vaitkus and J. E. Griffith, “An Evaluation
of Unit Replacement on Individual Morale and Cohesion in the All-voluntary Army,” Military Psychology
2 (1990): 221–39.
3. G. L. Siebold, “Military Group Cohesion,” in Military Life: The Psychology of Serving in Peace
and Combat, vol. 1 of Military Performance, ed. T. W. Britt, C. A. Castro, and A. B. Adler (Westport, CT:
Praeger Security International, 2006), 185–201.
4. See, for example, J. E. Griffith, “The Measurement of Group Cohesion in U.S. Army Units,” Basic
and Applied Social Psychology 9 (1988): 149–71; G. L. Siebold, “Conceptualization and Definitions of

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 Siebold / Military Group Cohesion 295

Military Unit Cohesiveness” (paper presented at the 95th Annual Convention of the American
Psychological Association, New York, NY, August 1987); and G. L. Siebold and D. R. Kelly, Development
of the Combat Platoon Cohesion Questionnaire, Technical Report 817 (Alexandria, VA: U.S. Army
Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences, 1988)(DTIC no. ADA 204917).
5. M. Salo and G. L. Siebold, “Cohesion Components as Predictors of Performance and Attitudinal
Criteria” (paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Military Testing Association,
Singapore, November 2005).
6. See, for example, reviews in P. T. Bartone, B. H. Johnsen, J. Eid, W. Brun, and J. C. Laberg,
“Factors Influencing Small-unit Cohesion in Norwegian Navy Officer Cadets,” Military Psychology 14,
1 (2002): 1–22; L. W. Oliver, J. Harman, E. Hoover, S. M. Hayes, and N. A. Pandhi, “A Qualitative
Integration of the Military Cohesion Literature,” Military Psychology 11, 1 (1999): 57–83; and G. L.
Siebold, “The Evolution of the Measurement of Cohesion,” Military Psychology 11, 1 (1999): 5–26.
7. Salo and Siebold, “Cohesion Components.”
8. G. L. Siebold, “Patterns in Cross-echelon Criterion Ratings of Platoon Cohesion and
Performance,” National Journal of Sociology 3, 1 (1989): 121–26.
9. F. J. Kviz, “Survival in Combat as a Collective Exchange Process,” Journal of Political and
Military Sociology 6 (Fall 1978): 219–32.
10. K. S. Cook, “Networks, Norms, and Trust: The Social Psychology of Social
Capital,” Social Psychology Quarterly 68, 1 (March 2005): 4–14.
11. See comments in R. Gal, “Commitment and Obedience in the Military: An Israeli Case Study,”
Armed Forces & Society 11, 4 (1985): 553–64; W. D. Henderson, Cohesion: The Human Element in
Combat (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1985); and C. C. Moskos, Jr., “From
Institution to Occupation: Trends in Military Organization,” Armed Forces & Society 4, 1 (1977): 41–50.
12. King, “The Word of Command.”
13. Ibid., 497.
14. E. A. Shils and M. Janowitz, “Cohesion and Disintegration in the Wehrmacht in World War II,”
Public Opinion Quarterly 12, 2 (Summer 1948): 280–315.
15. King, “The Word of Command,” 509.
16. Ibid., 494.
17. Ibid., 495.
18. Ibid., 496.
19. Ibid., 496.
20. See discussion of swift trust in U. Ben-Shalom, Z. Lehrer, and E. Ben-Ari, “Cohesion during
Military Operations: A Field Study on Combat Units in the Al-Aqsa Intifada,” Armed Forces & Society
32, 1 (October 2005): 63–79.
21. King, “The Word of Command,” 505.
22. Ibid., 508.
23. Ben-Shalom, Lehrer, and Ben-Ari, “Cohesion during Military Operations.”
24. King, “The Word of Command,” 506.
25. For example, see Ben-Shalom, Lehrer, and Ben-Ari, “Cohesion during Military Operations,” and
L. Wong, “Combat Motivation in Today’s Soldiers,” Armed Forces & Society 32, 4 (July 2006): 659–63.

Guy L. Siebold is a social psychologist at the United States Army Research Institute for the Behavioral
and Social Sciences, with three decades of experience conducting research on military issues in person-
nel, training, and leadership, with special emphasis on unit dynamics, cohesion, motivation, leadership,
morale, and culture and language training. He completed four years in the United States Air Force, includ-
ing a tour in Vietnam. He holds a law degree from American University and a doctoral degree from the
University of Illinois–Chicago. Address for correspondence: Guy L. Siebold, 7633 Kingsbury Road,
Alexandria, VA 22315, U.S.A.; E-mail: guysiebold@verizon.net.

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