Resilience: A Definition in Context

The Australian Community Psychologist Volume 22 No 1 December 2010 © The Australian Psychological Society Ltd During the past few decades there has been a proliferation of research on resilience. This interest in resilience is not surprising as many disciplines (psychology, social work) move from a deficit, ‘glass half empty’ view of human nature to a positive, salutogenic, ‘glass half full’ approach. Contemporary psychological research has a much more semi-permeable quality with psychological researchers throwing caution to the wind and involving themselves in contexts, and with methods, that in the past were challenging. Masten and Wright (2010) present an overview of the four waves of resilience research in which they propose that initially resilience research focused on the definitions and descriptions of resilience; the second wave focused on the variables associated with resilience: the third wave sought to test resilience intervention ideas; and the fourth wave, that is current resilience research, seeks to advance resilience studies in integrative ways to “better understand the complex processes that lead to resilience” (p. 214). In order to place our current understanding of, and position on, resilience, the authors will briefly outline the key issues in resilience research and present the most contemporary definitions in the field. This will be followed by an exploration of resilience through four separate case studies where each presents data on participants, analysis, and key findings. Key themes relevant to resilience are identified and discussed for each case study. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of the research, and a proposed definition of resilience. Borrowed first from the physical sciences, early research on resilience was not initially characterised as ‘resilience’ research. Early resilience research focused on risk factors to chronic and acute illness for adults (Dawber, Meadors, & Moore, 1951), and for children, the focus was on vulnerability in impoverished and troubled families (Werner & Smith, 1982). Therefore the negative effects of adversity were an important focus for researchers in defining resilience outcomes. People were deemed resilient if they did not develop problems (Garmezy, Masten, & Tellegen, 1984). Even today the vast majority of research on resilience has focused on at-risk children and adolescents (Cicchetti & Rogosch, 2007; Curtis & Cicchetti, 2007; Flores, Cicchetti, & Rogosch, 2005; Luthar, Cicchetti & Becker, 2000; MartinezTorteya, Bogat, von Eye, & Levendosky, 2009; Ribbens McCarthy, 2006) and therefore many resilience intervention programmes have been developed for children and adolescents. However, despite numerous and significant risk factors cited in the literature, not all children and adolescents who were considered ‘at-risk’ developed mental health issues/problems (Ungar, 2005a; Ungar, 2005b). In terms of defining resilience, there is Resilience: A Definition in Context