The Concept of Resilience

Resilience has numerous definitions that encompass biological, psychological and environmental processes (Rolf and Johnson 1999).

Generally, resilience is characterised by the presence of good outcomes despite adversity, sustained competence under stress or recovery from trauma (Masten and Coatsworth 1998).

Resilience is not a static trait, but a dynamic process that may change with time and circumstances (Cicchetti and Toth 1998).

Initially, researchers used the terms “invulnerable” and “invincible” to describe at-risk children who adjusted well (Wyman et al. 1999). These terms connoted the idea of a special but static trait or characteristic found in exceptional children (Wyman et al. 1999).

More recently, researchers have discussed individual resilience within the context of general developmental processes and have moved away from notions of invulnerability and invincibility to a more dynamic view of resilience (Luthar et al. 2000a, 2000b). Defining resilience as a process instead of a trait paints a fuller, multidimensional picture and helps us to understand that certain attributes might produce resilience in one social context, but not in another. It also helps in thinking about the design of effective interventions and leads to the idea that to be effective interventions may need to teach or support context-specific skills or attributes.

From Family Resilience and Good Child Outcomes: A Review of the Literature, a New Zealand Report by Ariel Kalil