Resiliency Requires Changing Hearts and Minds
By Bonnie Benard

Judging from the positive response I've had to my document on resiliency published a year and a half ago, as well as from the growing number of recent books and articles incorporating this concept, I feel the need to address what I see as the fundamental issue of the "resiliency approach" --the shifting of our personal perspective, our paradigms, from a focus on risks and deficits to a focus on protection and strengths. My concern is that the movement toward resiliency-- toward creating family, school, and community environments rich in the protective factors of caring, high expectations, and opportunities for meaningful participation-- not dissolve into more add-on, quick-fix programs and strategies.

Systemic Change

The building of resilient kids is a long-term developmental process that involves systemic change--the fundamental altering of our human systems, including the family, the school, the neighborhood, community-based organizations, and the workplace to make each of these arenas supportive, caring, participatory climates for all involved persons. Fostering resiliency isn't something we do to kids; it isn't about teaching them "resiliency skills," per se. Rather, protective-factor research has clearly shown us that the development of resiliency is the process of healthy human development that is based on and grows out of nurturing, participatory relationships grounded in trust and respect. If we as adults and preventionists are truly concerned with preventing problems like alcohol and other drug abuse, then it is imperative that we make our central vision and mission the creation   of supportive relationships with youth and their families. Only then will we be helping to create what Garmezy calls a "protective shield" that helps children "withstand the multiple vicissitudes that they can expect of a stressful world" (1991).

Years of educational and community research have documented that long-lasting, systemic change--change that is infused throughout the daily life of the school and community and not just a tacked on program begins with our beliefs, feelings, and attitudes. If we have the attitudes, we can easily learn skills and strategies; if we try to learn skills and strategies that don't match our attitudes and values, we'll drop them by the wayside. Consider this example from education: It is futile for a teacher to learn the logistics of creating cooperative learning groups in her classroom when she believes that kids need a competitive environment to be motivated or that only she has the expertise and right answers. On the other hand, the belief that each child has talents and skills to share with others will encourage her to use a pedagogy like cooperative learning.

It is only when we change our paradigms--that is, our world view or the lens through which we see our world--that we will change our feelings, beliefs, and attitudes, and ultimately our behaviors and practices. To make the systemic changes in our schools, community-based organizations, and prevention programs that will foster resiliency in kids and families depends ultimately, then, on changing the hearts and minds of all those who work with them.

Paradigm Shifting

"Paradigm-shifting" is a concept appearing in the dialogue of several fields, especially organizational development. Probably 100 different terms describe paradigm-shifting. We can best summarize the resiliency perspective this way: seeing people as resources, as experts in their own lives, as possessing innate mental health and well-being, instead of identifying and labeling them as problems. As Bill Lofquist so eloquently puts it: "If we were to use as a beginning point a new commitment to viewing and respecting young people as resources in all that we do--which incidentally would mean that we would also begin viewing and respecting all people as resources--we would create a new basis for shaping a shared vision and clear mission for youth opportunity systems" (1992).

If we are to shift our prevention paradigm to a resiliency focus, we have to let go of our preoccupation with risk and risk factors as the research base guiding our planning and evaluation efforts. Solutions do not come from looking at what is missing; solutions will come by building on strengths. While several approaches to prevention programming try to combine a risk- and protective- factor approach, I believe that these are two incompatible paradigms for change. Individuals cannot simultaneously hold on to two competing paradigms; we cannot simultaneously see the proverbial glass as both half-empty and half-full. Thomas Kuhn, who coined the paradigm-shift concept 30 years ago in his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, discusses it as requiring a "transformation of vision" that "cannot be made a step at a time, forced by logic and neutral experience. Like a gestalt switch, it must occur all at once or not at all" (1962, p. 149). The shift is born out of "flashes of intuition" or like "scales falling from one's eyes."

As change agents, we have to focus on what works, on what we've learned from longitudinal research about what protects kids living in high-risk environments, on what we've learned from programs that have successfully reduced problems such as alcohol and other drug abuse, teen pregnancy, and school failure. As Werner and Smith state in their recent book Overcoming the Odds: High Risk Children from Birth to Adulthood: "Our findings and those by other American and European investigators with a life-span perspective suggest that these buffers make a more profound impact on the life course of children who grow up under adverse conditions than do specific risk factors or stressful life events. They appear to transcend ethnic, social class, geographical, and historical boundaries. Most of all, they offer us a more optimistic outlook than the perspective that can be gleaned from the literature on the negative consequences of prenatal trauma, care giving deficits, and chronic poverty. They provide us with a corrective lens--an awareness of the self-righting tendencies that move children toward normal adult development under all but the most persistent adverse circumstances" (1992, p. 202).

This quote provides two critical rationales for the resiliency paradigm. First, we know that the protective factors of caring relationships, high expectations, and opportunities for meaningful participation are more powerful than risk factors and serve to protect kids across ethnic, social class, geographical, and historical boundaries. Second, a resiliency paradigm offers us as change agents hope and optimism, which not only can influence positive intervention outcomes but can also prevent burn-out. We know, all too well, the power of negative expectancies to become negative outcomes. We also know how negative expectancies result in high levels of burn-out among teachers and other human service workers. In a discussion of paradigm-shifting in The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change, Stephen Covey sees positive expectancies toward others as a "self- renewing" process "What do we reflect to others about themselves? And how much does that reflection influence their lives? We have so much we can invest in the emotional bank accounts of other people. The more we can see people in terms of their unseen potential, the more we can use our imagination rather than our memory, with our spouse, our children, our co-workers or employees. We can refuse to label them--we can see' them in new fresh ways each time we're with them. We can help them become independent, fulfilled people capable of deeply satisfying, enriching, and productive relationships with others" (1989, p. 301).

Moreover, as researcher Martin Seligman explains in his recent book focused on his paradigm shift from studying learned helplessness to learned optimism (Learned Optimism, How to Change Your Mind and Your Life), optimistic people "do better in school, win more elections, and succeed more at work than pessimists do. They even seem to lead longer and healthier lives!" (1990, p.96- 97). A third related rationale I will propose is that a risk-factor approach itself can become a risk factor. While labeling is noticeably absent from most lists of risk factors, an enormous body of research has documented the deleterious effects of programs that label and track kids. Yes, we try to talk about high-risk environments, but we still end up with programs for high-risk kids, families, schools, and communities. We end up with programs that perhaps further "blame the victim" and further stigmatize disenfranchised populations.

Furthermore, the labeling process is clearly a demotivator to change. For change to happen, people have to have a sense of self-efficacy. They have to believe and have hope that they have the strengths and the abilities to make positive changes. A risk-factor approach that sees the "half-emptiness" of kids, families, schools, and communities can only further entrench feelings of "internalized oppression" that disenfranchised groups in our country already feel. As community development specialist John McKnight explains: "Our greatest assets are our people. But people in low-income neighborhoods are seldom regarded as assets.' Instead, they are usually seen as needy and deficient, suited best for life as clients and recipients of services. Therefore, they are often subjected to systematic and repeated inventories of their deficiencies with a device called a needs survey.' The starting point for any serious development effort is the opposite of an accounting of deficiencies. Instead there must be an opportunity for individuals to use their own abilities to produce. Identifying the variety and richness of skills, talents, knowledge, and experience of people in low-income neighborhoods provides a base upon which to build new approaches and enterprises" (1992, p. 10).

Beyond Therapy

Educator and writer Herb Kohl also provides us with a clear challenge to move from a risk to a resiliency paradigm: "Although I've taught in East Harlem, in Berkeley, and in rural California, I have never taught an at-risk student in my life. The term is racist. It defines a child as pathological, based on what he or she might do rather than on anything he or she has actually done. It is a projection of the fears of educators who have failed to educate poor children. Rather than define children as at risk,' it would be educationally and socially more effective to join with community members and fight to eliminate poverty. Standing with the community is one strong way of showing children that their teachers care and are willing to take risks for them, instead of dubbing them at risk'" (Nathan, 1991, p. 679). Similarly, in her latest book, Anne Wilson Schaef argues for moving from a mechanistic scientific paradigm to an empowering participatory paradigm. Beyond Therapy, Beyond Science: A New Model for Healing the Whole Person challenges all helping professionals to examine their underlying paradigm: "Are psychologists and others in the helping professions open to ask, Is the unspoken world view that underlies the assumptions in the way I practice my profession perhaps, unwittingly, contributing to the very problems that I am committed to help solve? If we are not open to struggling with this question and articulating our assumptions, we are, indeed, part of the problem" (1992, p. 227).

The challenge to us as preventionists, then, is to look within ourselves, examine our personal lenses, reflect on our practices, discuss our beliefs, values, and feelings with others, and listen to the kids and families we work with. Finally, we have to let prior negative beliefs and assumptions.

"Change--real change--comes from the inside out. It doesn't come from hacking at the leaves of attitude and behavior with quick-fix personality ethic techniques. It comes from striking at the root- -the fabric of our thought, the fundamental, essential paradigms, which give definition to our character and create the lens through which we see the world" (Covey, 1989, p. 317). Moving to a resiliency approach requires a personal transformation of vision. Creating positive changes in ourselves requires a context characterized by caring relationships, mutual respect, and active participation.

Inside-out change means that we take care of ourselves, that we love and accept ourselves. This message resounds through the anthology Healers on Healing: "The best thing therapists, whether medical or psychological practitioners, can do to help their clients the most is to love themselves. When therapists really love who they are, it's easy for them to teach that love to their clients....When we're willing to love and accept ourselves, we can make changes" (Hay, 1989, p. 23).

References

Covey, Stephen. The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1989.

Garmezy, Norman. Resiliency and vulnerability to adverse developmental outcomes associated with poverty. American Behavioral Scientist 34 (4), 1991, 416-430.

Hay, Louise. Healer, heal thyself. In Healers On Healing, ed. by Richard Carlson and Benjamin Shield. Los Angeles: Jeremy Tarcher, 1989, 22-26.

Kuhn, Thomas. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962.

Lofquist, William. Let's create a new culture of youth work in America. New Designs for Youth Development, Winter 1992, 23-27.

McKnight, John. Mapping community capacity. , Winter 1992, 9-15. New Designs for Youth Development

Nathan, Joe. An interview with Herbert Kohl: Toward educational change and economic justice. Phi Delta Kappan 72(9), May 1991, 678-681.

Seligman, Martin. Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind and Your Life. New York: Pocket Books, 1990.

Werner, Emmy and Ruth Smith. Overcoming the Odds: High Risk Children from Birth to Adulthood. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1992.

Wilson Schaef, Anne. Beyond Therapy, Beyond Science: A New Model for Healing the Whole Person. San Francisco: Harper, 1992.

Bonnie Benard, Western Regional Center for Drug-Free Schools and Communities, Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory.