Correlates of Resilience in Adolescents and Adults

We sought to examine several positive and negative correlates of resilience (i.e., affect, gratitude, perceived stress, subjective happiness, mastery, and emotional reactivity) in a community sample of adolescents and adults and to determine whether these correlates of resilience differed between the groups. Seventy-nine community residents of an Upper Midwest community (48 adolescents aged 12-18 years and 31 adults aged 34-84 years) completed 8 validated self-report questionnaires, totaling 96 items, over an 8-week period. Bivariate analyses showed several moderate to large associations of the variables with resilience and several appeared to show differences in the magnitude of the associations by age group. Hierarchical regression models examining all psychosocial predictors of resilience showed that only positive affect and negative affect predicted unique variance in resilience. In addition, evaluation of hierarchical models showed evidence of interaction between age and positive affect, gratitude, and subjective happiness in predicting resilience. Associations between gratitude, positive affect, and happiness with resilience were consistently stronger for adults as compared to adolescents. These data provide preliminary evidence on potential differences to consider regarding psychosocial correlates of resilience in adolescents and adults and have implications for intervention and resilience promotion.