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APA's Resilience Initiative.

Article  in  Professional Psychology Research and Practice · June 2005

DOI: 10.1037/0735-7028.36.3.227

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 Professional Psychology: Research and Practice Copyright 2005 by the American Psychological Association
2005, Vol. 36, No. 3, 227–229 0735-7028/05/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/0735-7028.36.3.227

APA’s Resilience Initiative

Russ Newman
American Psychological Association

Resilience is the human ability to adapt in the face of tragedy, trauma, adversity, hardship, and ongoing
significant life stressors. Focus groups conducted by the APA Practice Directorate after the terrorist
attacks of September 11, 2001, found people to be experiencing a chronic sense of stress and uncertainty
for which they wanted to be more resilient. In response, APA launched its public education campaign,
“The Road to Resilience,” in August 2002. A key component of the campaign is community outreach by
psychologists, in which psychologists around the country bring information about resilience directly into
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.

their communities. This has allowed psychologists to help their communities and to help communities
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.

better understand the value of psychology.

Keywords: resilience, public education, community outreach

Resilience is the human ability to adapt in the face of tragedy,
trauma, adversity, hardship, and ongoing significant life stressors.
This is a concept with which psychologists have been familiar for
quite some time. A considerable body of research has shown that
even when some children are exposed to significant hardship and
adversity during their developmental years, they are still well able
to thrive as adults (Masten, 2001). And research has demonstrated
a wide range of behaviors associated with resilience, behaviors that
are rather ordinary, not extraordinary, and can be learned by
almost everyone.
For the lay public, however, the notion of resilience has been
recognized only relatively recently and has seemingly worked its
way into our country’s lexicon since the events of September 11,
2001. It is actually not surprising that the idea has come to the fore
in the wake of the worst terrorist attack this country has ever
experienced. After all, terrorism is an attempt to keep people in a
state of threat and uncertainty and prevent them from living their
lives in the way they normally would because of the ever-present
fear of more attacks. This country, however, has refused to do that;
it has demonstrated resilience in the face of the ongoing threat and
uncertainty.
Following 9/11, the American Psychological Association’s
(APA) Practice Directorate, which had been engaged in the “Talk
to Someone Who Can Help” public education campaign since
RUSS NEWMAN received his PhD in clinical psychology from Kent State
University in 1979 and his JD from Capital University Law School in 1987.
He is currently the executive director for professional practice at the
American Psychological Association, where he is responsible for promot-
ing the association’s multifaceted agenda on behalf of practicing psychol-
ogists. He manages a variety of activities involving legislative advocacy,
legal initiatives, and efforts to shape the evolving health care market. He
has written and spoken extensively on professional and public policy issues
related to psychology.
CORRESPONDENCE CONCERNING THIS ARTICLE should be addressed to Russ
Newman, Executive Director for Professional Practice, Practice Director-
ate, American Psychological Association, 750 First Street, NE, Washing-
ton, DC 20002-4242. E-mail: rnewman@apa.org
1996, conducted focus groups across the country to test the con-
tinued relevance of the campaign’s existing messages and to take
the pulse of the nation after this tragedy. It was anticipated that
people would experience a qualitatively new and different sense of
stress and uncertainty in light of the unprecedented events that had
occurred. This turned out not to be the case. Rather, focus group
participants did not feel there was anything new or qualitatively
different about the uncertainty they felt post-9/11, only that there
was more of it. Some described their experience of stress and
uncertainty as having become “chronic.” In addition, people said
they were not so much interested in simply “living with” or even
“coping with” this chronic sense of stress and uncertainty as they
were interested in “bouncing back.” In effect, they wanted to be
resilient in the face of this experience.
APA believes that psychologists are uniquely suited to be edu-
cators about resilience. Although much of the material available to
the public on resilience was informational and self-help in nature,
building resilience is actually a much more complicated process.
To begin with, resilience is a multidimensional and not a unitary
concept. There is no one characteristic or trait identified as resil-
ience. Rather, there are many behaviors and actions associated
with resilience. Maintaining good relationships, having an opti-
mistic view of the world, keeping things in perspective, setting
goals and taking steps to reach them, and being self-confident, for
example, all are associated with resilience (e.g., Luthar & Cic-
chetti, 2000).
Second, one individual’s strategy for building resilience will
likely not be the same as another’s. Picking and choosing from
among the array of behaviors and actions associated with resil-
ience is an individualized process dependent, in part, on each
individual’s strengths, skills, and experience. In the end, finding
the strategy that works best for an individual to build resilience is
a personalized process.
Third, although building resilience can be done by everyone, it
is not so easily accomplished by people who have specific psy-
chological disorders. Someone suffering from depression, for ex-
ample, can certainly benefit from strengthening resilience. It is

227
 228 ANOTHER VOICE
unlikely, however, that this will be accomplished simply by offer-
ing the person information and self-help materials. Rather, inte-
grating the process of building resilience into the person’s psycho-
logical treatment for depression would be necessary. Similarly, a
person with a serious mental illness could also likely benefit from
building resilience, but doing so would need to be integrated with
recovery interventions and strategies.
Armed with the conviction that psychologists are the logical
professionals to help people learn about and build resilience, in
August 2002 the APA launched its public education initiative,
“The Road to Resilience,” a campaign designed to help the public
learn ways to build resilience in the face of trauma and hardship
and throughout daily life. One resource for this project is a con-
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
sumer brochure, titled The Road to Resilience, which has now been
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
distributed to more than 130,000 people. The campaign included a
partnership with the Discovery Health Channel, which aired a
documentary, Aftermath: The Road to Resilience, coproduced by
Discovery and the APA. The documentary used the events of
September 11 as a springboard to show that resilience can be used
to deal with a variety of hardships that range from unemployment
to the death of a loved one.
A special launch of “The Road to Resilience” project was held
in Bethesda, Maryland, on September 9, 2002, in conjunction with
the Maryland Psychological Association, Discovery Health, Com-
cast, and the Mental Health Association of Montgomery County,
Maryland. An estimated 150 people attended this event, which
included a screening of the documentary and a panel discussion
that included a Maryland woman whose husband was one of the
casualties of the terrorist attack on the Pentagon.
The event and others like it exemplified a key component of the
campaign: community outreach by psychologists, in which psy-
chologists around the country bring information about resilience
directly into their communities. As part of the campaign, APA has
provided psychologists with training and with a practitioner toolkit
that provides step-by-step suggestions for successful community
outreach. Psychologists throughout the country have used the
campaign’s practitioner toolkit to educate about ways to build
resilience.
Other examples of post-9/11 activities include the following:
1. A resilience presentation was made to a faculty group at
Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, following the East
Coast sniper attacks in November 2002. This included participa-
tion by a police officer from the Washington, DC, area. The highly
publicized attacks made everyone feel uneasy about their personal
safety. The title of the presentation, which was chosen by the
administration of the university, was “Feeling Safe in an Unsafe
World.” The police officer provided practical tips on how to keep
safe physically, and the psychologist focused on how to keep safe
emotionally.
2. The Pennsylvania Psychological Association distributed re-
silience brochures on September 11, 2002, at the State Museum of
Pennsylvania in Harrisburg as part of the “Flight 98 Remembered”
exhibit.
3. A psychologist conducted a presentation in Minnesota and
distributed 300 brochures as part of a postdisaster recovery
workshop, “Flood, Mud, and Crud: Dealing with the NW Min-
nesota Floods,” for health and mental health professionals and
clergy.
4. On March 19, 2003, when the United States engaged in war
with Iraq, APA released the “Resilience in a Time of War”
materials to help the public build resilience in the face of the stress
and anxiety associated with war. A series of six resilience in war
brochures were immediately made available at the outset of war
via APA’s consumer website, www.APAHelpCenter.org, and bro-
chures made available in print form soon followed. More than
140,000 of these print and online brochures have been requested.
The brochures include a general resilience in war brochure for the
general public and four developmentally appropriate brochures for
parents, teachers, and caretakers of youth, ranging from the pre-
school level through high school age youth. A sixth brochure
targets teens directly with strategies to help them adapt to wartime
stress. These brochures include tips such as taking a break from
watching the news and enlisting children’s help in chores that help
them regain a sense of control.
5. Once troops began to return home, a seventh brochure,
Homecoming: Resilience After Wartime, was made available for
free download from the online Help Center (URL given above).
6. A forum held in conjunction with the California Psycholog-
ical Association’s annual meeting demonstrated the breadth of the
resilience message, as it focused not just on wartime resilience but
also on bouncing back from illness such as breast cancer and from
economic hardship.
7. APA responded to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome
(commonly known as SARS) scare with an online fact sheet,
“Resilience and Disease Outbreaks” (available at http://helping
.apa.org/articles/article.php?id⫽54), which was written with the
help of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
As psychologists reach out to communities with lessons about
building resilience, it is important to recognize the potential impact
of this endeavor. The benefits of resilience go beyond just helping
people feel good. First, it is expected that building resilience can
help reduce stress and even prevent stress to some degree. Second,
there may be significant health consequences to increasing resil-
ience. For example, research demonstrates that people with good
relationships—the behavior most frequently associated with resil-
ience—tend to be healthier than those without good connections to
others (Berkman & Syme, 1979, as cited in Anderson & Anderson,
2003). Similarly, people who maintain an optimistic view of the
world—another of the behaviors frequently associated with resil-
ience—tend to be healthier (Anderson & Anderson, 2003). To the
extent, then, that building resilience includes fostering these be-
haviors, better health may result as well.
Research also has shown that some of the behaviors associ-
ated with resilience are related to longevity. In particular, good
relationships, optimism, and the ability to find meaning in
difficult life experiences all have been linked to living longer
(Anderson & Anderson, 2003). Helping people learn these
behaviors as a part of a strategy to build resilience may also
help people live longer.
For psychologists, using resilience as a bridge to their com-
munities has proven valuable as well. Not only does informa-
tion about building resilience allow psychologists to help their
 ANOTHER VOICE 229

communities, it also helps communities understand the value of
psychology. In fact, where there has been community outreach,
people have even gone beyond understanding the value of
psychology to actually experiencing the value of psychology for
themselves.
Luthar, S. S., & Cicchetti, D. (2000). The construct of resilience: Impli-
cations for interventions and social policies. Development & Psychopa-
thology, 12, 857– 885.
Masten, A. S. (2001). Ordinary magic: Resilience processes in develop-
ment. American Psychologist, 56, 227–238.

References
Anderson, N. B., & Anderson, P. E. (2003). Emotional longevity: What Received February 17, 2005
really determines how long you live. New York: Viking. Accepted March 14, 2005 䡲
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.

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