Rear Adm. Jennifer Couture, who heads the Naval Service Training Command, told reporters the first eight weeks of boot camp include a lot of character development for the recruits. The added two weeks, she said, are meant to be a “reinforcing mechanism.”

“We’re telling our recruits … here are all of the things that we expect you to do, and here’s how we expect you to behave and act,” she said, adding that it involves treating people with respect and holding peers accountable. “We believe very strongly that those types of behaviors are directly impacting our fighting readiness and the performance of our sailors.”

The military as a whole has been seeing increases in sexual assaults and suicides, prompting congressional criticism and spurring leaders to scramble for ways to address the perennial problems. More recently, the services have been struggling to root out racism and extremism, after a number of former and current service members were involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.