Community Resilience as a Metaphor, Theory, Set of Capacities, and Strategy for Disaster Readiness

Communities have the potential to function effectively and adapt successfully in the aftermath of disasters. Drawing upon literatures in several disciplines, we present a theory of resilience that encompasses contemporary understandings of stress, adaptation, wellness, and resource dynamics. Community resilience is a process linking a network of adaptive capacities (resources with dynamic attributes) to adaptation after a disturbance or adversity. Community adaptation is manifest in population wellness, defined as high and non-disparate levels of mental and behavioral health, functioning, and quality of life. Community resilience emerges from four primary sets of adaptive capacities--Economic Development, Social Capital, Information and Communication, and Community Competence--that together provide a strategy for disaster readiness. To build collective resilience, communities must reduce risk and resource inequities, engage local people in mitigation, create organizational linkages, boost and protect social supports, and plan for not having a plan, which requires flexibility, decision-making skills, and trusted sources of information that function in the face of unknowns.     

Collective rumination: When “problem talk” impairs organizational resilience

When adversity strikes, organization members often turn to others in order to vent their negative emotions and receive social support. While social interaction is commonly seen as a major resource for organizational resilience, dysfunctional social interactions and their negative effects on coping with and overcoming adversity are less well understood. This conceptual article develops theory on collective rumination—defined as repetitive and prolonged discussions of adverse events that center on the negative and uncontrollable aspects of the situation—and its detrimental effects on organizational resilience. We elaborate that collective rumination emerges through a vicious circle of a shared negative situational assessment and mutual contagion with highly negative emotions. Based on our theorizing, we propose that collective rumination is negatively related to three core dimensions of organizational resilience: perceptions of control, commitment to joint action, and the acceptance of adversity as a challenge. With our conceptual article, we answer earlier calls to theorize about forms of social interactions that are not valuable but destructive for organizational resilience and elucidate previously neglected social dynamics that are dysfunctional for recovering from adversity.     

The role of psychological resilience and positive affect in risky decision‐making

Past studies suggest that positive affect produces a wide range of desirable outcomes because it helps people build lasting resources. It may be assumed that these resources build on positive affect over time, which in turn may explain the beneficial effect of positive affect in stressful encounters. However, this assumption has not been directly tested by empirical studies. This question is important in that it helps clarify the underlying mechanism through which individuals with more positive affect might respond adaptively to adverse situations. Using a stressful task that included 20 rounds of risky investment choices, the current study examined whether psychological resilience, an important personal resource fuelled by positive affect, could account for the beneficial effects of positive affect. Specifically, we examined the relationship between individuals’ baseline levels of positive affect, their levels of psychological resilience, their choices in a risky investment decision task, and their levels of positive affect on the final investment task. The results demonstrate that psychological resilience could indeed help explain happier people's enhanced outcomes: They chose higher return although more risky investment options and experienced more positive affect at the end of the task. The current study supports the notion that individuals who experience frequent positive affect thrive through various challenges not simply because they feel good, but because they have resources that they can utilize to deal with these challenges. Findings from the present study support further investigation of the important relationship between specific positive affect, psychological resilience, and performance in risky investment tasks.     

Children's Coping in the Context of Disasters and Terrorism

Disasters and terrorism present significant and often overwhelming challenges for children and families worldwide. Individual, family, and social factors influence disaster reactions and the diverse ways in which children cope. This article links conceptualizations of stress and coping to empirical knowledge of children's disaster reactions, identifies limitations in our current understanding, and suggests areas for future study of disaster coping. Coping strategies, developmental trajectories influencing coping, and the interplay between parent and child coping represent critical areas for advancing the field and for informing programs and services that benefit children's preparedness and foster resilience in the face of mass trauma.     

Like a Fish Out of Water: Reconsidering Disaster Recovery and the Role of Place and Social Capital in Community Disaster Resilience

In this paper we draw on the findings of a critical, multi-sited ethnographic study of two rural communities affected by a wildfire in British Columbia, Canada to examine the salience of place, identity, and social capital to the disaster recovery process and community disaster resilience. We argue that a reconfiguration of disaster recovery is required that more meaningfully considers the role of place in the disaster recovery process and opens up the space for a more reflective and intentional consideration of the disorientation and disruption associated with disasters and our organized response to that disorientation. We describe a social-psychological process, reorientation, in which affected individuals and communities navigate the psychological, social and emotional responses to the symbolic and material changes to social and geographic place that result from the fire's destruction. The reorientation process emphasizes the critical importance of place not only as an orienting framework in recovery but also as the ground upon which social capital and community disaster resilience are built. This approach to understanding and responding to the disorientation of disasters has implications for community psychologists and other service providers engaged in supporting disaster survivors. This includes the need to consider the complex dynamic of contextual and cultural factors that influence the disaster recovery process.     

A Community Responds to Collective Trauma: An Ecological Analysis of the James Byrd Murder in Jasper, Texas

The brutal murder of James Byrd Jr. in June 1998 unleashed a storm of media, interest groups, high profile individuals and criticism on the Southeast Texas community of Jasper. The crime and subsequent response—from within the community as well as across the world—engulfed the entire town in a collective trauma. Using natural disaster literature/theory and employing an ecological approach, Jasper, Texas was investigated via an interrupted time series analysis to identify how the community changed as compared to a control community (Center, Texas) on crime, economic, health, educational, and social capital measures collected at multiple pre- and post-crime time points between 1995 and 2003. Differences-in-differences (DD) analysis revealed significant post-event changes in Jasper, as well as a surprising degree of resilience and lack of negative consequences. Interviews with residents conducted between March 2005 and 2007 identified how the community responded to the crisis and augmented quantitative findings with qualitative, field-informed interpretation. Interviews suggest the intervention of external organizations exacerbated the severity of the events. However, using strengths of specific local social institutions—including faith based, law enforcement, media, business sector and civic government organizations—the community effectively responded to the initial threat and to the potential negative ramifications of external entities.     

Beyond stigma: Understanding the “inclined abstainers” in military behavioral health-care utilization

ABSTRACT

Low treatment utilization in Soldiers with combat-related Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is an ongoing issue. The critical concern is to better understand factors which prohibit a Soldier with PTSD who wants help from seeking treatment (an “inclined abstainer”). A total of 537 Active Duty Soldiers on a US Army post completed a brief survey comprising psychometrically validated measures of stigma, behavioral health treatment beliefs, resilience, PTSD symptoms, and treatment intentions. Health-care records were prospectively tracked for 12 months to determine the relation between survey answers and treatment utilization. Sixty-three percent of those who acknowledged having a mental health-related problem did not seek help within a one-year period. Greater severity of PTSD symptoms was associated with an increased likelihood of behavioral health engagement. Soldiers that were classified as “inclined abstainers” were also more likely to endorse negative beliefs about psychotherapy and report higher levels of resilience as compared to “inclined actors.” These results suggest that a treatment model of PTSD emphasizing self-efficacy and self-reliance, while addressing negative beliefs about psychotherapy, may help promote engagement of behavioral health services among Active Duty Soldiers.     

Sleep,resilience, and psychological distress in United States military Veterans

Sleep problems are prevalent among Veterans. Left untreated, such problems may elevate psychological distress and increase risk of subsequent mental health disorders. Psychological resilience may buffer against negative psychological outcomes, yet the relationship between sleep and resilience has not been studied. This study explored poor sleep, resilience, and psychological distress using questionnaires collected as part of the Study of Post-Deployment Mental Health. Participants (N = 1,118) had served in the US military since September 11, 2001, had one or more overseas deployments, and were free from a past-month DSM-defined mental health disorder. Hierarchical linear regression was used to examine the association between poor sleep quality (Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index total score) and psychological distress (Global Symptom Index; Symptom Checklist-90-R), controlling for demographic and health characteristics. Moderation analyses tested for a potential buffering effect of resilience (Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale). Poor sleeping Veterans had worse physical and psychological health, lower resilience, and endorsed more lifetime traumatic events. Poor sleep was associated with greater psychological distress controlling for health and demographic characteristics. Both resilience factors—adaptability and self-efficacy—had significant buffering effects on the relationship between poor sleep and psychological distress, suggesting that resilience may protect against negative outcomes in poor sleepers. Additional research is warranted to better understand the relationships between sleep, resilience, and psychological distress. Such research may inform pertinent prevention efforts, including interventions that improve sleep, enhance resilience, and protect against incident mental health diagnoses.     

Bonding and bridging social capital and their associations with self‐evaluated community resilience: A comparative study of East Asia

The purpose of this study is to test key social capital indicators in a disaster context by considering the bonding and bridging types of social capital. Using the East Asian Social Survey, this study chooses three behavioural/cognitive elements of social capital—social trust, voluntary association membership, and personal networks—and divides them into bonding and bridging social capital, in‐group and out‐group trust, homogeneous and heterogeneous membership, and strong and weak ties to test their effects on self‐evaluated community resilience to natural hazards. The results showed that social trust and personal networks had strong positive effects, but the effect of voluntary association membership was positive in societies with high rates of membership (Japan and South Korea) and negative in a society with a low rate of membership (Taiwan). Furthermore, while bonding social capital generally showed a stronger effect than bridging social capital in East Asia, a society with more frequent and intense disasters (Japan) showed a strong effect of heterogenous membership on self‐evaluated community resilience. This study connects two aspects of social capital studies—the elements and the types of social capital—and the findings imply that the relationship between social capital and community resilience may have some mediator variables.     

Adding ‘Flock’ to ‘Fight and Flight’: A Honeycomb of Resilience Where Supply of Relationships Meets Demand for Support

In this article I explain how solidarity can support positive adjustment, collective in nature, where people face chronic, cumulative stress and largely lack resources. I propose that when individuals use relationships as a way to access and mobilise resources, an enabling ecology is configured to foster positive adjustment. Applying a collectivist, transactional-ecological view of resilience I propose Relationship-Resourced Resilience (RRR) as a generative theory to explain how resilience occurs as collective, rather than individual and subjective processes. To do this, I draw on eight years of longitudinal case study data that were generated using a Participatory Reflection and Action (PRA) approach with partnership schools (N = 12, primary = 9, secondary = 3; urban = 9, rural = 3) and teachers (N = 74, female = 63, male = 11). The RRR model posits that, when under threat of chronic stress in a poverty setting, a collective response is to flock (rather than fight or flight). Flock entails a process of alone-standing individuals, experiencing shared and persistent burdens, connecting to access, share, mobilise and sustain use of resources for positive adaptation. RRR extends current resilience views of subjective, individual adjustment to individually reported stress in the direction of resilience as collective experiences of continual stress with subsequent collective positive adaptation.     

青少年心理韧性量表的编制和效度验证

心理韧性（resilience）是积极心理学的热点课题。虽然国外已有很多测量工具,但在中国群体中的适用性未得到支持。基于心理韧性的过程模型,通过访谈法开发适合我国青少年群体的心理韧性测量工具。通过访谈25名经历过较大负性生活事件而又适应良好的中学生,编制出100个题目,在283名青少年中初测,通过项目鉴别度分析和探索性因素分析,保留了27个题目,包含目标专注、情绪控制、积极认知、家庭支持和人际协助五个因子,α均大于0.7。复测样本包含420名青少年,验证性因素分析支持了量表的结构效度,二阶因素分析发现前3个因子属于个人力,后2个因子属于支持力。以其他心理韧性量表（RS）和中学生生存质量为关联效标,皮尔逊相关分别为0.53和0.49,支持了量表的外部效度。文章最后讨论了我国青少年心理韧性结构的文化意义及量表的应用范围     

Resiliency in the Face of Adversity: A Short Longitudinal Test of the Trait Hypothesis

Resilience represents coping with adversity and is in line with a more positive paradigm for viewing responses to adversity. Most research has focused on resilience as coping—a state-based response to adversity. However, a competing hypothesis views resilience or resiliency as a trait that exists across time and types of adversity. We tested undergraduates enrolled in social work classes at a large southern university at two time periods during a single semester using measures of adversity, positive and negative affect, and trait-based resiliency. Consistent with the trait-based resiliency, and in contrast to state-based resilience, resiliency scores were not strongly correlated with adversity at both testing points but were with positive affect, and resiliency scores remained the same over time despite adversity variations. There was no gender or ethnic group difference in resilience scores. Black/African Americans reported significantly less negative affect and more positive affect than White/Caucasians.     

Strengthening Resilience in a Risky World: It's All About Relationships

SUMMARY

Building on Judith Jordan's earlier work on relational resilience, this paper challenges the commonly held view that resilience is a unique form of individual “toughness” endowed to a lucky few and suggests that resilience can be strengthened in all people through participation in growth-fostering relationships. The author reviews the research describing individual, internal characteristics associated with resilience and explores the relational aspects of these characteristics. A case example illustrates that efforts promoting relational development help people grow through and beyond experiences of hardship and adversity. In addition, the author proposes specific ways resilience can be strengthened through engagement in relationships that enhance one's intellectual development, sense of worth, sense of competence, sense of empowerment, and, most importantly, sense of connection.     

Negative misconceptions about disaster behaviour through availability cascades: An examination of secondhand information and the moderating effect of trait anxiety on disaster myths

The present study was designed to shed light on the origin of disaster myths, such as panic, looting, crime, and psychological shock in postdisaster situations, by examining effects of secondhand information and the moderating effect of anxiety on such negative misconceptions. It was hypothesized that secondhand information on disaster behaviour, such as media reports and word‐of‐mouth rumours, and trait anxiety would increase the degrees to which people gave credit to four popular disaster myths. Also, trait anxiety was predicted to moderate the association between information sources and disaster myths. Questionnaire data obtained from 1,500 Japanese participants indicated that people relying on secondhand information gave more credit to all the four misconceptions than those relying on firsthand information such as direct disaster experience. However, trait anxiety was not found to significantly affect the degrees of the disaster myths. Furthermore, the moderating effect of trait anxiety on the association between the information sources and the disaster myths was not observed in any of the four myths. The present results imply that although reliance on secondhand information increases the degree of disaster myths to some extent, there should be other causes from which disaster myths originate.     

重大自然灾害后快速心理危机干预

重大自然灾害后,使用心理危机干预的专业方法,利用心理危机快速反应专家服务组,给受灾者带来常规社会救援不能解决的紧急心理救护和进一步的心理援助,使不幸的人们在绝望中鼓起勇气、获得希望,并与他们一起共同度过人生中这段最艰难的时刻。面对灾难,危机干预是利国利民的重要事务,是政府对灾难后受灾人群进行人文关怀和构建和谐社会的直接体现。     

Importance of Religion after Adversity

After major adversity, some people rely on their religious faith and networks for comfort, support, and material goods and services. Consistent with this behavior are findings that adversity has a positive causal effect on the importance of religion in people's lives. Using a large high-frequency US dataset, we estimate the causal effects of natural disasters on stated religious importance and attendance at religious services. Effects are identified by comparing changes in outcomes over time within counties affected by a natural disaster with changes over time in other counties from the same state. We find that most estimates are near-zero in magnitude; for the full sample, for subgroups defined by religious affiliation, demographics, and income, and for different disaster types. However, significant negative effects are found immediately postdisaster, suggesting a short-term crowding-out effect in which recovery activities limit time for worship. This explanation is supported by a finding that people are less “well rested” in the first weeks postdisaster.     

青少年负性情绪事件性质判断偏向的情绪弹性和性别效应

研究以青少年学生为被试,采用测验和实验的方法考察了情绪弹性和性别变量对青少年在四类负性情绪事件性质的判断偏向上可能产生的影响。结果表明：（1）情绪弹性对青少年加工负性情绪事件信息时的判断偏向产生一定影响,低情绪弹性个体在面对与一般生活情境相关的负性情绪事件时,更倾向于从消极方面对事件的性质加以判断。（2）性别对青少年加工负性情绪事件信息时的判断偏向不产生实质性影响。     

青少年感恩与创伤后应激障碍症状的关系:社会支持和心理弹性的中介作用

在"5.12"汶川地震后18个月时,采用青少年感恩量表、社会支持评定量表、心理弹性量表和创伤后应激障碍自评量表,对都江堰地区1439名经历地震的青少年进行问卷调查,考察感恩、社会支持、心理弹性与创伤后应激障碍(PTSD)症状的关系。结果表明:(1)感恩、社会支持和心理弹性均与PTSD症状呈显著的负相关,相关系数分别为-0.18,-0.17和-0.24;(2)感恩不仅直接影响PTSD症状,而且还通过社会支持和心理弹性的部分中介作用间接影响PTSD症状,中介效应占总效应的62%。