Resiliency in Adolescence

In the past 25 years, developmental psychopathologists and other social scientists have increasingly explored the concept of “invulnerability” or resiliency rather than focusing predominantly on vulnerability and maladjustment (Luthar, Cicchetti, & Becker, 2000). In addition, research on resiliency has shifted its focus from the emphasis on negative developmental outcomes (e.g., risk behaviors) to an emphasis on successful adaptation in spite of childhood adversity (Masten & Coatsworth, 1998; Werner & Smith, 1992). Indeed, social scientist researchers' understanding of resiliency has moved from examining “invulnerable” persons to viewing resiliency as an “operation within human adaptational systems” (Masten, 2001, p. 227).

Examining individuals exposed to biological risk factors and stressful life events is the hallmark of resiliency research. The assumption is that resiliency can only be displayed or detected through an individual's response to adversity, whether it is a stressful life event or a situation of continuous stress (e.g., war, abuse; Masten & Coatsworth, 1998). Initially, investigators emphasized the association between a single risk [Page 939]variable, such as low birth weight or a stressful life event (e.g., parental discord), and negative developmental outcomes. Borrowing from the field of epidemiology, social science researchers have moved from a main effect model of resiliency research to a model that emphasizes interactional effects among multiple stressors, for example, as in the literature that stresses the co-occurrence of parental psychopathology (e.g., alcoholism or mental illness) and poverty (Masten & Coatsworth, 1998; Werner & Smith, 1992).

Consequently, resilient individuals are well-adapted individuals in spite of serious stressors in their lives (Luthar et al., 2000; Masten, 2001). Indeed, resilient individuals are those who cope effectively with stresses arising as consequences of their vulnerability. This coupled with a balance, congruence, or fit among risk, stressful life events, and protective characteristics of the individual and the individual's ecology accounts for the diversity of developmental outcomes (Ford & Lerner, 1992; Kumpfer, 1999). Therefore, studying resiliency involves an examination of the link between the person and the demands of the context in variables, factors, and processes that will either promote or subvert adaptation. Resiliency is the individual's ability to adapt well to his or her changing environment, an environment that includes stressors (e.g., accidents, death of a loved one, war, and poverty) and daily hassles (e.g., negative peer pressures and grades; Perkins & Borden, 2002).

In resiliency, the processes involved in the context/ecology interplay are composed of the interaction over time between the protective factors and/or risk factors at multiple levels that contributes to the direction of the developmental outcomes, whether positive or negative. This interaction is complex and requires a holistic, comprehensive perspective in order to be adequately examined and understood. Models derived from this perspective posit that there are reciprocal influences between the organism and the context/environment (Schneirla, 1957) and that development occurs through these mutual influences (Ford & Lerner, 1992; Kumpfer, 1999). Moreover, these models assert that any single explanation of risk-taking behaviors with regard to protective factors and risk factors is too simplistic, in that such explanations are likely to ignore the importance of multiple ecological influences, multiple constitutional influences, and the interactions that develop among them. In fact, several scholars have suggested that the use of the term factor may in fact suggest too static a relationship among risk characteristics, protective characteristics, and risk behaviors (Kumpfer, 1999). Process may be a better way to describe the dynamic nature of risk and protective characteristics.

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