Resilience and Empowerment

By: Lindsey, Summer, & Liz

Introduction:

• “Don’t be a prisoner of your past, but a pioneer of your future”

• Sandy Taylor

Resilience:

• Definitions: • “refers to a positive adaptation, or ability to maintain or

regain mental health, despite experiencing adversity” (Herrman, 259).

• “the ability to bounce back from adversity and successfully adapt to the demands of stressful situations” (Mak, 2).

• “the process of adapting well in the face of adversity. Research has shown that resilience is ordinary, not extraordinary” ("Road to resilience," 2012).

Negative Cognitive Triad:

Resilience is to be associated with the use of positive affect

Making use of positive emotions= bounce back from adversities.

The way people perceive and interpret adversity affects the way they feel and how they relate to the world around them.

“Depressed individuals view themselves, their world, and future in a negative fashion” (Mak, 2)

Positive Cognitive Triad

Resilience is not a trait

• People do not have resilience!!!

• Developing resilience consist of behaviors, thoughts, and actions that can be learned by anyone!

Sources of Resilience:

• Personal Factors: openness, extraversion, and agreeableness. Which Tara and Chervelle both exhibited in the movie All of Us.

• Another part is cognitive flexibility, social attachments, positive self concepts, spirituality, active coping, optimism, hope, resourcefulness, and adaptability. Chervelle showed continuously throughout the movie how these attributes fit her; attending church, getting her GED then a job she had hope for the future.

Sources of Resilience:

• Biological Factors: Brain changes and other biological processes can affect the capacity moderate negative emotions and affect resilience to adversities

• Environmental-Systematic Factor: Social support, relationships with family and peers is correlated with resilience. Unfortunately Tara’s main and only support was her boyfriend who was staying with her for sex, her wasn’t there for her emotionally. For Chervelle she made a great support system for herself; the church, friends, and family.

Factors in Resilience:

• Primary factor is having a caring and supportive relationships within and out of your family. This love and trust will present support and comfort.

• The capacity to make realistic plans and carry them out

• An affirmative view of self and confidence in your strengths and capabilities

• Communication skills and problem solving• The ability to cope with strong feelings and

emotions

Indicators of Resiliency:• Behavioral

• Emotional

• Educational

How to Build Resilience:• 1.) make connections: close

family members, friends & others. Accepting help and support is just as important so those close to you can who are will listen to you and strengthen your resilience.

• 2.) avoid seeing crisis as insurmountable problems: you cant change that a highly stressful event happened to you, but you can change how you interpret and respond to these event.

• 3.) Accept that change is a part of life: focus on the events you can make different.

• 4.) Move towards goals: develop realistic goals.

• 5.) Take decisive action: don’t detach from the problem and wish it would just go away.

• 6.) Look for opportunities for self discovery: learn about yourself; may feel a greater sense of strength even while feeling vulnerable, gain an increased sense of self-worth and appreciation for life.

• 7.) Nurture a positive view of yourself: develop confidence in ability to problem solve.

• 8.) Keep things in perspective: keep things in a broader context

• 9.) Maintain a hopeful outlook: optimistic outlook, visualize what you want rather than worry

• 10.) Take care of yourself

Where to find help:

• Self-help and support groups

• A licensed mental health professional– Psychologist– Therapist– Social worker– Etc…

Empowerment:

Empowerment

Principle of Self-empowerment:• Stresses the clients rights and

responsibility in the development of human empowerment.

• “People empower themselves: social workers should assist” (Boehm, 450).

Empowerment Model:

• “In the empowerment model health care professionals respect the patient and assist in making decisions in ways that have meaning to the patient” (Lau, 372).

• This model is one of reciprocal respect and the respect stems from seeing the meaning in human life and building good rapport.

Empowerment Model

Concept of Empowerment:• Patient empowerment is all about

helping people assert control over factors that cause distress to their health.

• The way the patient empowerment starts is with information and education, this might include the patient seeking it out on their own, being assertive and contributing in treatment decisions.

Key Elements:

• Knowledge

• Behavioral skills

• Self- responsibility

• Working relationship between health care professionals and patient

Attributes of an Empowered Patient:

• “empowered patients tend to be highly interactive and communicative with their health care providers and are involved in their treatment decisions” (Marelich, 475).

Tying the two together:

• The strengths based perspective helps build a persons resilience while empowerment is at the core of the perspective. Resilience and empowerment work together and lead to wellness for the individual.

Strengths Based Perspective:

Empowerment:• Helping process to assist

people to use their strengths to overcome their challenges

Resilience:• The ability to recover

quickly from adversity; as well as a the continuation of growth, knowledge, insight, and virtues.

Strengths based perspective:

• “The strengths based perspective is a dramatic departure from conventional social work practice. Practicing from strengths orientation means this- everything you do as a social worker will be predicated on helping to discover, explore, and exploit clients strengths and resources in the service of assisting them to achieve their goals and realize their dreams” (Rankin, 5).

Principles of strengths based perspective:• 1.) Everyone has strengths• 2.) Trauma, abuse, illness, and struggle

can also be bases for challenge and opportunity

• 3.)Collaboration with client works best• 4.) Every environment is full of resources• 5.) Care, Caretaking context

“Developmental RESILIENCE, healing and WELLNESS, solution focused therapy, asset based community development” (Rankin, 5).

The strengths perspective involves empowerment as a major part as well as resilience and wellness; you cant have one without the other.

Resilience, healing, and wellness were all demonstrated in the documentary All of Us!

References:• Boehm, A. (2002). The functions of the social worker in empowering: The voices of

consumers and professionals. National Association of Social Work, 47(4), 449-460.

• Delport, R., Strydom, H., Theron, L., & Geyer, S. (2011). Voices of HIV&AIDS-affected

• educators: how they are psychosocially affected and how REds enabled their

• resilience. AIDS Care, 23(1), 121-126. doi:10.1080/09540121.2010.498857.

• Herrman, H., Stewart, D. E., Diaz-Granados, N., Berger, E. L., Jackson, B., & Yuen, T.

• (2011). What Is Resilience?. Canadian Journal Of Psychiatry, 56(5), 258-265.

• Lau, D. (2002). Patient empowerment- a patient centered approach to

improve care. Hong Kong Medical Journal, 8(5), 372-374.

Mak, W. S., Ng, I. W., & Wong, C. Y. (2011). Resilience: Enhancing Well-Being

• Through the Positive Cognitive Triad. Journal Of Counseling Psychology, 58(4),

• 610-617. doi:10.1097/a0025195.

• M, W. D. (2003). Effects of empowerment among HIV-positive women on the

• patient-provider relationship. AIDS Care, 15(4), 475.

Rankin, P. (2007). Exploring and describing the strength/ empowerment

perspective in social work. Journal of Social Work Theory and Practice, (14), 1-25.

Road to resilience. (2012). Retrieved from http://apa.org/helpcenter/road-resilence.aspx