The Temporal Elements of Psychological Resilience: An Integrative Framework for the Study of Individuals, Families, and Communities

Abstract

Psychological resilience has become a popular concept. Owing to that popularity, the word resilience has taken on myriad and often overlapping meanings. To be a useful framework for psychological research and theory, the authors argue, the study of resilience must explicitly reference each of four constituent temporal elements: (a) baseline or preadversity functioning, (b) the actual aversive circumstances, (c) postadversity resilient outcomes, and (d) predictors of resilient outcomes. Using this framework to review the existing literature, the most complete body of evidence is available on individual psychological resilience in children and adults. By contrast, the research on psychological resilience in families and communities is far more limited and lags well behind the rich theoretical perspective available from those literatures. The vast majority of research on resilience in families and communities has focused primarily on only one temporal element, possible predictors of resilient outcomes. Surprisingly, however, almost no scientific evidence is actually available for community or family resilient outcomes. We close by suggesting that there is room for optimism and that existing methods and measures could be relatively easily adapted to help fill these gaps. To that end, we propose a series of steps to guide future research.

Key words:

• adversity
• community
• family
• resilience
• trauma

Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge the important input at various stages of development from Astier Almedom, Lennart Olsson, and members of the Lund University Center for Sustainability Studies (LUCSUS), Lund, Sweden.

Funding

The development of this article was supported by generous funding from the Rockefeller Foundation (2012-RLC 304).