Active Duty and Reserve Component Spouse Surveys

About the Survey

The Active Duty and Reserve Component Spouse Surveys gather information from active duty and Reserve component spouses that measure aspects of military life, for example, the impact of PCS moves on families, spouse employment/career, financial conditions, impact of deployments, and well-being of spouses and children.

Spouse surveys are conducted every two years. The next Active Duty Spouse Survey is scheduled for 2023 and the next Reserve Component Spouse Survey is scheduled for 2023.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Military Spouse Survey Program?

The Military Spouse Survey is a DoD personnel program that features web-based surveys sponsored by the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. These surveys enable DoD to regularly assess the attitudes and opinions of the DoD community, including active duty and Reserve component members and their spouses on the full range of personnel and family issues.

Why should I participate?

This is your chance to be heard on issues that directly affect you, including the impact of deployments on you, your spouse and children, your employment opportunities, medical and dental benefits, and overall satisfaction with military life. Your responses on this survey make a difference.

Why does the survey ask personal questions?

OPA reports overall results, as well as by other characteristics, such as location and gender. To complete these analyses, we must ask respondents for these types of demographic information. Analyzing results in this way provides Defense leaders information about the attitudes and concerns of all subgroups of personnel and family so that no groups are overlooked. Sometimes sensitive questions are asked in order to improve personnel policies, programs, and practices. Your answers to any personal questions are strictly used for this purpose and will not be used to identify individual respondents. As with all questions on this survey, your responses are confidential.

Will my answers be kept private?

Your response will be kept private to the extent permitted by law. If you answer any items in such a way that you indicate distress or being upset, you will not be contacted for follow-up purposes. However, if you indicate a direct threat to harm yourself or others within responses or communications about the survey, because of concern for your welfare, OPA may notify an office in your area for appropriate action. All data will be reported in the aggregate and no individual data will be reported. We encourage you to safeguard your Ticket Number to prevent unauthorized access to your survey. In addition, to ensure your privacy, be aware of the environment in which you take the survey (e.g., take the survey when no one else is home, take care to not leave the survey unattended).

Do I have to answer all the questions?

No, it is not necessary to answer every question. You can skip any question that you prefer not to answer.

How do I know this is an official, approved DoD survey?

The Spouse Surveys are official DoD surveys sponsored by the DoD Military Community and Family Policy (MC&FP) office. The survey has gone through approvals at all levels of DoD leadership and has been reviewed and approved by the DoD Privacy office and DoD Human Research Protections Program. The survey is also licensed by the Washington Headquarters Services (WHS). All multicomponent data collection in the Department must be licensed and show that license as a Report Control Symbol (RCS) or an Office of Management and Budget (OMB) control number and expiration date.