Staff Perspective: How Do We Define "Resilience"?
As a military spouse, I frequently hear my family described as resilient, particularly when we are navigating a challenge in service to my partner’s military career. Sometimes I pause and take in the constellation of changes we are facing – frequent and prolonged periods apart, distance from our dearest friends and family, my own constantly changing career trajectory, racing the PCS clock to adopt our son before we land in a new state – and I can take in that we are making a happy life, with new perspectives, new friends, and meaningful experiences despite the upheaval.
As a mental health provider, I’ve felt this same gut sense of appreciation, almost like a calm port in a storm, witnessing a military spouse’s calm resolve as she learned of her son’s terminal cancer diagnosis while her husband faced combat thousands of miles away. As a play therapist, primarily serving kids with significant adverse childhood experiences, resilience in its most tender form has emerged in the way that children who are facing poverty, abuse, and oppression embrace opportunities to trust others, share their joy, and heal their hurt, even amidst daily experiences of fear and deprivation.
I have a gut sense of what ‘resilience’ feels like when I encounter it, yet I struggle to define it. Is it a trait intrinsic to each person? There are several traits associated with resilience, including optimism, cognitive flexibility, and meaning and purpose in life (Southwick et al., 2015), however, I find that these ebb and flow, depending on my life circumstances. For example, optimism feels infinitely more accessible to me when I am physically healthy and have the perception that I have the skills I need to solve the problems I am facing.
So then, is resilience a process, characterized by each person’s approach to coping with stress? Resilience is correlated with health-promoting behaviors, emotion regulation, and problem-solving ability (Southwick et al., 2015), but how much of those skills is ‘enough’ to truly constitute subjective well-being? Is resilience something revealed in an outcome? Some researchers have operationalized resilience by measuring the relationships between risk and protective factors and mental health diagnoses. While I balk at the idea that resilience is mutually exclusive with a mental health diagnosis, I appreciate that the interaction of risk and protective factors represents correlates of resilience on a continuum across domains of functioning, systems, and development (Masten, 2014; Pietrzak & Southwick, 2011).
Researchers and clinicians naturally differ in their conceptualizations of resilience. The American Psychological Association (2014) proposed that resilience is, “the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats, or even significant stress” (p. 1). Neuroscientist Rachel Yehuda emphasized learning and self-concept by defining resilience as a “reintegration of self that includes a conscious effort to move forward in an insightful, integrated, positive manner as a result of lessons learned from an adverse experience” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 3). Clinical psychologist George Bonnano highlighted the relative stability of health when he defined resilience as a trajectory “characterized by a relatively brief period of disequilibrium but otherwise continued health” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 2). Child development scholar Ann Masten focused on the nature of adaptation in systems by defining resilience as “the capacity of a dynamic system to adapt successfully to disturbances that threaten the viability, the function, or the development of that system” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 3). Anthropologist Catherine Panter-Brick captured the cultural subjectivity of resilience by defining it as “a process to harness resources to sustain well-being” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 4), whereby the values, resources, and networks of a culture or community constitute well-being. For as many answers as these definitions provide, I have a dozen more questions.
How are adaptivity, positive coping, or well-being defined? Don’t those definitions change across environments and people? How do ‘resilient’ characteristics function across different social or occupational contexts? What does it mean if some traits, processes, or outcomes are positive for one area of life, but not another? How long can someone be in disequilibrium and still be considered resilient? Dear Reader, I wish that I could answer these questions and settle the tension that resides in not knowing. Until then, I will appreciate the moments of stillness when I see resilience in the wild.
The opinions in CDP Staff Perspective blogs are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Science or the Department of Defense.
Elizabeth Burgin, Ph.D., , is a Licensed Professional Counselor serving as a Military Behavioral Health Child Counselor at the Center for Deployment Psychology (CDP) at the Uniformed Services University for the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland
References:
American Psychological Association. (2014). The road to resilience. Retrieved from:
https://www.apa.org/helpcenter/road-resilience.aspx
Masten, A. A. (2014). Ordinary magic: Resilience in development. Guilford Press.
Pietrzak, R. H., & Southwick, S. M. (2011). Psychological resilience in OEF-OIF Veterans:
Application of a novel classification approach and examination of demographic and psychosocial
correlates. Journal of Affect Disorders, 133(3), 560-568.
Southwick, S. M., Bonanno, G. A., Masten, A. S., Panter-Brick, C., & Yehuda, R. (2014).
Resilience definitions, theory, and challenges: Interdisciplinary perspectives. European Journal of
Psychotraumatology, 5. https://doi.org/10.3402/ejpt.v5.25338
Southwick, S. M., Pietrzak, R. H., Tsai, J., & Krystal, J. H. (2015). Resilience: An update. PTSD
Research Quarterly, 25(4).
As a military spouse, I frequently hear my family described as resilient, particularly when we are navigating a challenge in service to my partner’s military career. Sometimes I pause and take in the constellation of changes we are facing – frequent and prolonged periods apart, distance from our dearest friends and family, my own constantly changing career trajectory, racing the PCS clock to adopt our son before we land in a new state – and I can take in that we are making a happy life, with new perspectives, new friends, and meaningful experiences despite the upheaval.
As a mental health provider, I’ve felt this same gut sense of appreciation, almost like a calm port in a storm, witnessing a military spouse’s calm resolve as she learned of her son’s terminal cancer diagnosis while her husband faced combat thousands of miles away. As a play therapist, primarily serving kids with significant adverse childhood experiences, resilience in its most tender form has emerged in the way that children who are facing poverty, abuse, and oppression embrace opportunities to trust others, share their joy, and heal their hurt, even amidst daily experiences of fear and deprivation.
I have a gut sense of what ‘resilience’ feels like when I encounter it, yet I struggle to define it. Is it a trait intrinsic to each person? There are several traits associated with resilience, including optimism, cognitive flexibility, and meaning and purpose in life (Southwick et al., 2015), however, I find that these ebb and flow, depending on my life circumstances. For example, optimism feels infinitely more accessible to me when I am physically healthy and have the perception that I have the skills I need to solve the problems I am facing.
So then, is resilience a process, characterized by each person’s approach to coping with stress? Resilience is correlated with health-promoting behaviors, emotion regulation, and problem-solving ability (Southwick et al., 2015), but how much of those skills is ‘enough’ to truly constitute subjective well-being? Is resilience something revealed in an outcome? Some researchers have operationalized resilience by measuring the relationships between risk and protective factors and mental health diagnoses. While I balk at the idea that resilience is mutually exclusive with a mental health diagnosis, I appreciate that the interaction of risk and protective factors represents correlates of resilience on a continuum across domains of functioning, systems, and development (Masten, 2014; Pietrzak & Southwick, 2011).
Researchers and clinicians naturally differ in their conceptualizations of resilience. The American Psychological Association (2014) proposed that resilience is, “the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy, threats, or even significant stress” (p. 1). Neuroscientist Rachel Yehuda emphasized learning and self-concept by defining resilience as a “reintegration of self that includes a conscious effort to move forward in an insightful, integrated, positive manner as a result of lessons learned from an adverse experience” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 3). Clinical psychologist George Bonnano highlighted the relative stability of health when he defined resilience as a trajectory “characterized by a relatively brief period of disequilibrium but otherwise continued health” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 2). Child development scholar Ann Masten focused on the nature of adaptation in systems by defining resilience as “the capacity of a dynamic system to adapt successfully to disturbances that threaten the viability, the function, or the development of that system” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 3). Anthropologist Catherine Panter-Brick captured the cultural subjectivity of resilience by defining it as “a process to harness resources to sustain well-being” (Southwick et al., 2014, p. 4), whereby the values, resources, and networks of a culture or community constitute well-being. For as many answers as these definitions provide, I have a dozen more questions.
How are adaptivity, positive coping, or well-being defined? Don’t those definitions change across environments and people? How do ‘resilient’ characteristics function across different social or occupational contexts? What does it mean if some traits, processes, or outcomes are positive for one area of life, but not another? How long can someone be in disequilibrium and still be considered resilient? Dear Reader, I wish that I could answer these questions and settle the tension that resides in not knowing. Until then, I will appreciate the moments of stillness when I see resilience in the wild.
The opinions in CDP Staff Perspective blogs are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Science or the Department of Defense.
Elizabeth Burgin, Ph.D., , is a Licensed Professional Counselor serving as a Military Behavioral Health Child Counselor at the Center for Deployment Psychology (CDP) at the Uniformed Services University for the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland
References:
American Psychological Association. (2014). The road to resilience. Retrieved from:
https://www.apa.org/helpcenter/road-resilience.aspx
Masten, A. A. (2014). Ordinary magic: Resilience in development. Guilford Press.
Pietrzak, R. H., & Southwick, S. M. (2011). Psychological resilience in OEF-OIF Veterans:
Application of a novel classification approach and examination of demographic and psychosocial
correlates. Journal of Affect Disorders, 133(3), 560-568.
Southwick, S. M., Bonanno, G. A., Masten, A. S., Panter-Brick, C., & Yehuda, R. (2014).
Resilience definitions, theory, and challenges: Interdisciplinary perspectives. European Journal of
Psychotraumatology, 5. https://doi.org/10.3402/ejpt.v5.25338
Southwick, S. M., Pietrzak, R. H., Tsai, J., & Krystal, J. H. (2015). Resilience: An update. PTSD
Research Quarterly, 25(4).