Page 61 - JSOM Spring 2018

However, collective military resilience could be encapsulated another attribute of resilience: that one can improvise and in-
as “the capacity of a community to proactively adapt, recover, vent to overcome adversity. Parsing definitions of community
and return to normalcy following severe disturbances.” That resilience as use of protective resources, Coutu extrapolated
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statement contains several implicit assumptions: The military further in declaring inventive use of resources contributes to re-
has innate and organic threats to normalcy, its very nature in- silience, which concurs with Garcia-Dia et al. Ability to brico-
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cludes severe disruptions, membership requires anticipating lage (i.e., to creatively construct resources from whatever is at
risk and possessing proactive responses, and those within its hand) during adverse circumstances dovetails with an attribute
body will have to overcome disruptions to return to baseline noted systematically throughout resilience literature: hardiness.
functioning. In and of itself, military culture presumably pro- Maddi deduced that low hardiness can increase the likelihood
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vides intrinsic community frameworks of resources for indi- of mental shock from military experiences, and circled back
vidual Servicemembers. Analyzing resilience in the military to consensus with Seligman, asserting that hardiness enables
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without incorporating those cultural contexts risks miscom- optimistically transforming experiences into meaning. Siebert
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prehending inherent ethnographic norms and values that can concurs: The highest and most unattainable levels of resilience
influence military resilience. Throughout the literature on are found in those able to grow after trauma and derive mean-
military resilience, grit, hardiness, adaptivity, adaptability, and ing from adversity. Dissimilarly, Gayton and Kehoe asked
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recovery were recurring attributes, inferring resilience existed their Australian SF applicant participants to rate and associate
or was occurring if those traits were present. personality trait elements like integrity and being hardworking
in defining attributes of resilience, a significant methodological
Evolution of defined resilience from prior decades are similarly departure from all other military resilience studies in which at-
rooted in attributes of capability, emphasizing performance tributes of resilience were defined by investigators.
capacity, such as overcoming adversity and strengthening
abilities in the process. Resilient individuals are described as Surrogate Term
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those possessing mechanisms enabling them to overcome ad- As a dispositional personality trait, researchers often hone in
versity and to strengthen abilities in the process. 46,47 Resilience on hardiness as a surrogate term for resilience, 56,57 and hardi-
was also characterized by proteanism, the ability to assume ness is an overarching theme in resilience literature, in particu-
many forms and evolve a self of many possibilities. Perfor- lar, military-specific literature. Ostensibly, hardy individuals
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mance capability continued as an overarching feature of re- are experienced in handling fatigue and hardship, are robust,
silience in definitions summarizing resilience as individual or and capable of withstanding adversity; they are bold, brave,
collective ability to cope with stress and catastrophe, including intrepid, and audacious. As a surrogate term for resilience,
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resilience as inoculation against negative events. From 1992 hardiness is proffered as an amalgamation of commitment,
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to 2017, resilience was consistently defined by properties and/ control, and challenge from which resilience is operational-
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or traits enabling recovery, either in morphology after being ized to quantify its presence in individuals. Hardy individuals
stressed or stretched, or anthropomorphically as an ability to are described as possessing specific attributes they elicit during
bounce back or adjust from adverse circumstances. 46-50 stress or adversity: commitment, as in maintaining involve-
ment and/or engagement versus isolating oneself; control, such
Historical definitions of community resilience aligned attri- as believing that applying effort can change outcomes; and
butes similarly. For clarity, community is inclusion in a group challenge, believing that change and/or adversity is expected
consisting of similar social, cultural, or religious characteris- and presents chances for personal growth. Throughout stud-
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tics, or belonging to groups of similar interests, values, histo- ies of military resilience, hardiness is used as an interchange-
ries, or responsibilities. Community resilience was delineated able term for resilience 44,61 and is routinely presented as an
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by attributes indicating capability, in which communities were innate personality characteristic.
resilient if significant adversity or risk were collectively con-
quered, though authors caution collective capabilities evolve Antecedents
over time and depend on resource and protective factor avail- For resilience to occur or be present, it is preceded and/or elic-
ability. Protective factors are also elements defining com- ited by an adverse event to overcome or situations for which
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munity resilience in groups of disadvantaged youth; the adaptation is required. Antecedents to resilience are risk,
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presence of community resilience predicates on protective fac- stress, trauma, and loss—neither collectively nor singular, nor
tors’ presence, such as neighbors, church members, and sup- in a particular order. Resilience is irrelevant if challenges do
portive elders. In both contexts, community resilience was not occur, despite the prevailing belief that resilience is an in-
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defined by presence of risk, protective factors (resources), and born trait. Using hardiness as a surrogate term, the adverse
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performance capability of the community members. These event eliciting a resilient response is one for which bravery,
contextual definitions of resilience within a community are courage, or internal fortitude are required. Antecedents to re-
particularly salient for SOF and SOF families, because risk is silience in the SOF community would thus include childhood
inherent and ever present, and protective-factor resources are experiences and associated life events, status of interpersonal
crucial to evoking resilience in the presence of adversity. relationships (e.g., friendships, relationship dysfunction or dif-
ficulties), experiences of rigorous training and selection for
Consensus within the literature suggests several attributes of SOF units, deployment experiences, combat trauma experi-
resilience analogously encapsulate capability: Seligman sur- enced either personally or proximally, deaths of close friends,
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mised optimism was a critical attribute of resilience in that distance from or proximity to family and support systems, and
optimism rendered one unaffected by defeat.Siebert noted tolerance of bureaucratic barriers. 62,63
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similar alignment with rejecting defeat: that attributes of re-
silience include persistence, such as refusal to capitulate and Consequences
the presence of fierce determination. From those emphases on Consequences of resilience are binary: positive or negative.
determinism, adaptability was further identified by Coutu as Such empirical referents are seen in operationalization of the
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