Building Your Bounce:
Promoting Adult Resilience
www.CenterForResilientChildren.org
Nefertiti B. Poyner
nbruce@devereux.org
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Devereux Center for
Resilient Children (DCRC)
• The mission of the DCRC is to promote
social and emotional development, foster
resilience, and build skills for school and
life success in all children and the adults
who care for them
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Devereux Center for
Resilient Children (DCRC)
Negative:
Vulnerability
Positive:
Resilience
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Devereux Suite of Assessments
• Four strength-based behavior rating
scales that measure within-child protective
factors related to resilience
– Each standardized on a nationally
representative sample of children
– Strong psychometric properties
– Span infancy through 8th grade (1 month
through 14 years)
– Completed by parents and teachers
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
The Need to Promote
Adult Resilience
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Devereux Center for
Resilient Children (DCRC)
• The well-being and resilience of teachers
needs to be promoted so they can in turn
support children in
acquiring social and
emotional skills.
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
• 22% of Americans
report experiencing
extreme stress
• 39% of Americans
report that their
stress has increased
over the past year
• 44% of Americans
report that their
stress has increased
over the past 5
years
• Significant sources of
stress include:
• money (75%)
• work (70%)
• the economy
(67%)
• relationships
(58%)
• family
responsibilities
(57%)
What risks resonate with
YOU right now?
Teacher Stress
• Sources of teacher stress:
– Demands of school reform efforts (NCLB)
– Administrative demands - excessive
paperwork, severe time constraints (Kyriacou,
2001; Lambert et al., 2009)
– More children with problem behaviors, lacking
motivation, or coming to school sleepdeprived (McCarthy & Lambert, 2006)
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Teacher Stress
• Sources of teacher stress (continued):
– More demanding or unsupportive parents
(McCarthy & Lambert, 2006)
– Lack of administrative support, poor working
conditions, lack of resources (Hammond &
Onikawa, 1997)
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Effects of Teacher Stress
• Can lead to poor physical health
• Headaches, gastrointestinal problems,
cold and flu episodes, sleep disturbances,
hypertension (Melamed et al., 2006)
• Can lead to mental health problems
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
…women working with children in Head Start
programs have poorer Physical and mental
health than do US women who have similar
socio-demographic characteristics.
Effects of Teacher Stress
• Depressed mood, reductions in selfesteem and self-efficacy, decreased
motivation, job dissatisfaction
• (Burke et al., 1996; Jurado et al., 1998;
Montgomery & Rupp, 2005; Santavirta et
al., 2007; Schonfield, 2001; Tennant,
2001)
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Effects of Teacher Stress
• Chronic stress can lead to burnout
• Burnout is well-documented in education
– More studies of teacher burnout than in any
other professional group (Lambert et al.,
2009)
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Effects of Teacher Stress
• Characterized by:
– Emotional exhaustion (fatigue, loss of energy)
– Negative or cynical attitudes towards the job
(job dissatisfaction)
– Reduced personal accomplishment (feeling
incompetent, low morale, reduced meaning or
fulfillment with the job)
(Guglielmi & Tatrow, 1998; Montgomery & Rupp, 2005;
Santavirta et al., 2007; Tennant, 2001)
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Caring for the
Caregiver:
Promoting the
Resilience in
Teachers
Jennifer R. Fleming
Paul LeBuffe
Mary A. Mackrain
Reduced Teacher Availability
Difficulty modeling
appropriate
social-emotional
skills
Direct
Negative
Effect on
Children
DCRC and Teacher Resilience
• As we ask teachers to build the social and emotional
well-being of children, we can’t forget that teachers’ own
social and emotional well-being is important too
Resilience:
Formal Definitions
• Ann Masten (2001) defined resilience as
“good outcomes in spite of serious
threats to adaptation or development”.
• Lifton (1994) identified resilience as the
human capacity of all individuals to
transform and change, no matter what
their risks, it is an innate “self-righting
mechanism”.
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Resilience
The ability to bounce back.
The ability to overcome misfortune or change.
How do you
think about or
define resilience?
Introduction to the
Devereux Adult Resilience Survey
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Development of the Devereux Adult
Resilience Survey (DARS)
• Development of the DARS began with a
literature review of adult resilience.
 What behaviors are important to help
adults bounce back in life?
 What behaviors do adults need to provide
nurturing, quality care to young children?
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Development of the Devereux Adult
Resilience Survey (DARS)
• Step Two: Focus groups with families,
early childhood caregivers and infant
mental health home-based clinicians.
• Step Three: Developed sample items
from literature review and focus
groups on what it means to be a
resilient adult
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Development of the Devereux Adult
Resilience Survey (DARS)
• Step Four: Talked with national experts
about the items, used their expertise to
formulate “scales” or areas of focus in
which the items fell.
• Step Five: Completed a Construct
Validity Study.
• DARS is appropriate for its intended
use (as a self-reflection checklist)
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Development of the Devereux Adult
Resilience Survey (DARS)
• DARS now available for free download
at www.DevereuxCenterForResilientChildren.
• The information can be used to help
individuals build on these strengths,
such as creativity and setting limits, so
that they can better cope with the
adversity and stresses of daily life.
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Psychometric Properties
of the DARS
• 721 early childhood teachers and caregivers
• Sample had a distribution similar to the U.S. Census (2007)
population data with regards to race, ethnicity, and age
• More females participated than males
• Completed the DARS and the Connor-Davidson
Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) in counterbalanced order
• CD-RISC is a 25 item scale comprising four factors related
to resilience
• Personal competence, intuition/coping, secure relationships,
and spiritual influences
Psychometric Properties
of the DARS
• Reliability:
• High internal consistency (a = .76)
• Items on the DARS correlate highly with one another
• Construct Validity:
• Correlated highly with CD-RISC scores (Spearman rho = .58, p = .01)
• DARS measures behavior related to resilience
• Statistical analyses were not statistically significant for men
and woman
• DARS is appropriate for its intended use (as a self-reflection
checklist)
Building Your Bounce
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
Complete a DARS
Devereux Center for Resilient Children © 2012
We may not
have time for
everything, but
can we begin
to make time
for the most
important
things?
Are you ready
to make yourself
a priority?
NEED PHOTO
NEED PHOTO
“If you concentrate on finding whatever is good in every situation,
you will discover that your life will suddenly be filled
with gratitude, a feeling that nurtures the soul.
- Rabbi Harold Kushner
Improved Health
Reach More Goals
Gratitude
What goodness has been
brought into your life
already?
Take a few minutes to
generate a mental or
written list of two or three
things you are grateful for.
The most powerful agent of
growth and transformation is
something much more basic
than any technique;
it’s a change of heart
- John Welwood
T
h
a
n
k
y
o
u
Reflection
What would happen in my personal
and professional life if I took time
to nurture my resilience?
When the blues
just won’t go away…
We are in this together!
Are there any questions?
“If we believe that our lives and
organizations will always include adversity,
disruptions, surprises and systemic
shocks, opening up to a further
investigation of resiliency might be a
purposeful and a survival skill.”
http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/leadership_360/2013/06/resilience_for_our_students_and_ourselves.html
Thank You!
For additional
information
please contact:
Debi Mahler
Director of
Professional
Development
dmahler@devereux.org