Resilience

Difficulties Operationalizing Resilience

Since the 1970s, resilience has been an area of research that moved away from the traditional medical model, which focused on clusters of symptoms, to focusing on holistic perspectives. Early pioneers focused on children’s personality characteristics (e.g., charisma and autonomy); however, as the work in the area evolved, there have been variations in definitions and use of terminology. Differences in the conceptualization of resilience revolve around the contextual circumstances of adversity and the process of positive adaptation. Because of these differences, various resilience models (e.g., social–ecological) and study designs (longitudinal vs. cross-sectional and person vs. variable based) have emerged.

The major differences between definitions of resilience include judgments concerning the operationalizing of adverse condition(s), which may range from a single event to chronic adverse events. Similarly, positive adaptation requires judgments about children’s and adolescents’ competence in particular domains (social, problem solving, and autonomy) and other proximal predictors such as family and social environment (school, peers, and community) characteristics. Given that resilience is a dynamic process that involves fluid predictive factors, a unique perspective to help examine such fluctuations is a unique developmental perspective, a developmental psychopathology process. As such, it is important to understand that resilience is a continuous variable and not a dichotomous attribute that is or is not present but a dynamic process for which no one factor promotes or inhibits resilience.

Developmental Psychopathology Perspective of Resilience

An important consideration is that children and adolescents and their families are influenced by different systems; therefore, it is important to examine resilience through a developmental psychopathology perspective. Developmental psychopathology is a developmental perspective on the etiology of mental disorders that begin during childhood and adolescence and uses a multidisciplinary conceptual approach. Developmental psychopathology is not just the study of disorders but also helps describe the developmental process between maladaptive and adaptive processes and the extent to which they influence developmental outcomes.

Knowledge of divergent pathways can inform researchers about particular adaptive or maladaptive processes. For example, an individual may be resilient in a particular context or experience but not in others. Furthermore, developmentally, characteristics of resilience may change across the life span. Therefore, resilience is best understood as a process.

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