LEC 2 - Individual Resilience Flashcards
What is Resilience (Lec 2)
- Dynamic system for successful adaptation to threats
- Preserve system function, viability, or development
- Applicable to living and nonliving systems
microorganisms, children, families - security system, economy, environment, etc.
- Applicable to living and nonliving systems
Not everybody bounces back or experiences personal growth → what are the individual mechanisms that gives rise to youngsters becoming resilient, how to improve and promote resilience in youngsters across our societies
What are the individual differences in adaptive functioning?
Different “types” of persons
A: stress-resistant (simplified), nothing changes
B: late-bloomer, recovery (experiencing recovery after a dip) → when is someone a late-bloomer? there is no specific timeframe to what a late-bloomer may indicate; but it does need a substantial amount of time between the moment that the adverse situation has finished and the dip that someone experienced followed by the recovery → in essence, in a clinical setting we would say a month, but in general we do not have a specific timeframe to indicate (late-bloomer)
C: personal growth, the individual does better after experiencing acute trauma or disaster (exceptional case)
difference between D and E is that E has a delayed maladaptive response
Where does individual resilience depend on?
A child is heavily influenced by what is happening on the outside, it is not an isolated thing, it is a hugely interactive system → although we often have the tendency of having a secluded isolated perspective on this youngster, you should always realize that this individual is basically the final/end product of a huge and complex and interactive system.
Resilience is never just one dimension of a person’s life! Infurna & Luthar
This is also the current perspective that we have on resilience, instead of having an isolated focus on a selected set of variables, we should have a broader perspective of resilience
What is Biopsychosocial-Ecological Resilience?
Biopsychosocial-ecological resilience is a comprehensive framework that examines how individuals and communities adapt to stress and adversity by considering multiple interconnected factors:
What can we say about individual resilience among homeless children?
Seemingly homogenous on the surface, the results of the study of individual differences in resilience in homeless children seem to be extremely diverse
- externalizing (anti-sociality, adhd, it is observable) and internalizing (you cannot see it) symptomatology
- developmental timing (at what age did the adverse situation surface)
Families in emergency shelter
-8-10 year old kids
-Huge variations in risk and functioning
-Dose of risk factors matters
-More risk factors > More problems
-Developmental timing matters
-Protective factors matter
One could be confronted with tons of negative factors, but still show resilience even with the maximum number of risk factors, if the weight of protective factors outweighs the weight of risk factors, if you have access to protective resources that could be counterweighted and help you in developing resilience → ultimately give rise to the individual differences that we see regarding resilience.
What is the role of Terror, Disaster and Mass Trauma in individual resilience?
terror, disaster, mass trauma
within the 21st century we have witnessed huge events that affect a group of individuals
- 9/11, tsunami and nuclear disaster in japan, covid-19
UN report: millions of youth affected annually
- hampers normal development
- precludes thriving trajectories (precludes thriving in various domains of life)
What are determinants for individual resiliency differences (Brunnermeier)
Determinants individual resiliency differences
- higher frequency/intensity → significantly related to more dysfunction
- developmental timing (does matter at what developmental stage you are, there is no unified linear relationship, it is really context dependent)
- individual factors: cognitive abilities, sex, personality (for example whether you are prone to stress or not etc. will affect how you cope), neurobiological make up (what you are born with and the things you experience during life have an influence on your neurobiological make up)
- environmental factors: family, friends, community (where do you live), culture (very broad, but in some cultures/countries religion plays a great role and some find comfort in religion), SES (socioeconomic status, what kind of neighborhood you live in, etc.)
*the frontal cortex is the last part of the brain that starts to mature; this comes to a completion around the age of 24-25-26, this is the reason that executive functions are undeveloped among really young children → cognitive abilities are really important to deal with disasters, trauma, war, etc.
“rather than lethargically avoiding risk, we should proactively develop societies that are resilient to adverse shocks” - the resilient society, markus k. brunnermeier
What is the role of the digital world in resilience and its impact? LEC 2
social media and youth
- 97% US youth have a social media profile
- half of them are almost constantly online
- similar trends across industrialized nations
social media benefits (13-17 year old youth, N=743)
- 81% more connected with friends
- 69% interact with more diverse people
- 68% gains access to social support during stress
teenage social media addiction → affects chemical processes in the brain
- “like”, “retweet”, “follow” activates reward system
- rush of dopamine creates temporary ‘high’
- pressure to stay ‘high’: more social media
- same pattern also seen in other addictions
- consumes daily life, endangers well-being
by spending time in the digital social world, you lose contact with the actual social world
online threats.
What is digital resilience? LEC 2
- understand: an individual understands when they are at risk online and can make informed decisions about the digital space they are in
- know: an individual knows what to do to seek help from a range of appropriate sources
- learn: an individual learns from their experiences and is able to adapt their future choices, where possible
- recover: an individual can recover when things go wrong online by receiving the appropriate level of support to aid recovery
