Personal Characteristics and Resilience to Economic Hardship and Its Consequences: Conceptual Issues and Empirical Illustrations

Abstract

This article describes a theoretical model that links personal characteristics with resilience to economic hardship and its psychological and interpersonal consequences. This transactional model integrates social influence and social selection perspectives concerning the relation between socioeconomic circumstances and the development of individuals and families. In addition, this article discusses methodological and conceptual issues related to investigating the effects of personal characteristics in this context. Finally, initial empirical support for some of the key predictions from the proposed model are provided using longitudinal data collected from a sample of Midwestern families. Specifically, adolescent academic achievement, self-reports of Conscientiousness and self-reports of low Neuroticism during adolescence predicted relevant outcomes in adulthood such as less economic pressure, more satisfying romantic relationships, and less harsh parenting behaviors. These preliminary findings support the hypothesized model and extend research concerning the life course outcomes associated with personal characteristics.

Conscientiousness, health, and aging: The Life Course of Personality Model.

“…It may be, though, that results from this large German sample would not generalize to the United States, where a larger percentage of the population is marginalized (e.g., impoverished) and thus more susceptible to the occurrence of life-events and their negative effects. With respect to chronic stressors, some evidence suggests that adolescent C decreases self-reported economic pressures in young adulthood (Donnellan, Conger, McAdams, & Neppl, 2009). And Vollrath (2000) reported that C is related to school-specific hassles among university students (e.g., nagging insecurity about one's choice of major).…”

Personality and Mental Health

“…The consistent results approve positive and protective effects of resilience in stress resistance (Ong et al, 2009), successful adjustment (Donnellan et al, 2009), positive emotions (Philippe et al, 2009), better quality of relationships with others (Bonanno, Papa, Moskowitz, & Folkman, 2005), subjective well-being (Burns & Anstey, 2010), physical and psychological health and well-being (Davis et al, 2009;Fava & Tomba, 2009;Salehinezhad & Besharat, 2010), and even speedy recovery illness (Yi-Frazier et al, 2009). In opposite, low levels of resilience relates to vulnerability, low levels of well-being, psychological disorders , maladaptive coping behavior, and negative defenses (Campbell-sills et al, 2006;Fava & Tomba, 2009;Philippe et al, 2009;Yi-Frazier et al, 2009).…”

“…Historically, resilience research has been largely the purview of developmental investigators dealing with early childhood and adulthood (Ong et al, 2009) and now has progressed to include early, middle, and late adulthood (Fava & Tomba, 2009). Clinical psychologists recently examined resilience in situations of economic hardship, social inequality and discrimination, psychological trauma, loss, bereavement, depression and pain (Davis et al, 2009;Donnellan et al, 2009;Keyes, 2009;Mancini & Bonanno, 2009;Southwick, Vythilingam, & Chamey, 2005;Zautra, Johnson, & Davis, 2005).…”

“…In other definitions it is called stress resistance (Garmzy, 1985) or post traumatic growth (Tedeschi, Park, & Calhoun, 1998). According to Bonanno (2004), resilience is more than surviving from life stresses and is not synonymous with invulnerability (Philippe, Lecours, & Beaulieu-Pelletier, 2009) but corresponds to successful adjustment (Donnellan, Conger, McAdams, & Neppl 2009), behavioral adjustment (Leve, Fisher, & Chamberlain, 2009) and hanging to balance after prior disequilibrium (Richardson, 2002).…”

Coping with Economic Stress: A Test of Deterioration and Stress-Suppressing Models

“…Studies have found individual and family variability in the response to economic stress (Donnellan, Conger, McAdams, & Neppl, 2009;Fonesca et al, 2016) and the reaction or appraisal of stressful situations differs across ethnic minority groups (Heslin, Bell, & Fletcher, 2012;Tandon et al, 2013). The impact of ethnic minority group membership expresses itself through (a) the differential risk of stress, (b) the variation in the appraisal of stress, and (c) the effect of stress-mediating variables (Aranda & Knight, 1997).…”