Psychosocial resilience and protective mechanisms

Abstract

During the past decade, the concept of "protective factors" has become firmly established in the field of psychiatric risk research (Garmezy, 1985; Masten & Garmezy, 1985; Rutter, 1979a, 1985a). It stems from the related notion of "resilience, " the term used to describe the positive pole of the ubiquitous phenomenon of individual difference in people's responses to stress and adversity. For many years the phenomenon had been put aside as largely inexplicable and therefore of little interest (Ainsworth, 1962). However, the issue of individual differences would not go away, and there came a growing appreciation that it was a key topic in risk research and that an understanding of the mechanisms involved should throw crucial light on the processes involved in risk itself, as well as having implications for prevention and intervention (Rutter, 1979a). Thus, in 1972, the study of individual differences was singled out as the most important development in "maternal deprivation" research (Rutter, 1972).