Is there some truth to the saying, what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger? According to researchers specializing in the area of post-traumatic growth, it varies from person to person. As Martin Seligman, PhD explained in a 2011 Harvard Business Review article, ‘how humans react to extreme adversity is normally distributed’.
Dr. Seligman continues to explain that on one end of the bell curve there are people who experience severe psychological despair, and PTSD. In the middle of the curve, we find the majority of people who will experience a psychological set-back but return to their normal baseline after a period of time. This he tags as ‘resilience’. Finally, on the other end of the curve we find people who experience a significant trauma, as well as the negative psychological state, but within a year they are actually better off than before their trauma.
It’s that subset of people on the far right of the distribution who experience what has become known as Post-Traumatic Growth (PTG). According to the Posttraumatic Growth Research Group at the University of North Carolina Charlotte, PTG is defined as ‘a positive change experienced as a result of the struggle with a major life crisis or traumatic event’.
UNC Charlotte researchers have identified five general areas where PTG tends to occur:
1) The belief that new opportunities have emerged because of the event.
2) A change in how we relate to others (for example, an increased sense of connection to others in similar circumstances).
3) A belief that we are stronger because of the event.
4) An increased appreciation for life in general.
5) A deepening of our religious or spiritual beliefs.
Creating A Shift & Increasing Chances For PTG
Over the past decade, the United States Army, has invested a significant amount of energy to help soldiers be more psychologically armed. The foundational belief is that by measuring baseline resilience as well as teaching positive psychology, the Army would be able to shift its distribution away from the PTSD end to the PTG end of the curve. The Master Resilience Training (MRT) program is based on the University of Pennsylvania’s Resilience Program and has been taught to hundreds of thousands of soldiers.
So the question presents itself: considering the numbers of soldiers who have completed MRT training, does the evidence exist showing that an increased knowledge base/ toolkit successfully helps them shift to the PTG side of the curve?
The short answer is ‘yes’.
According to a longitudinal study published by the US Army in 2011 and led by CPT Paul Lester, PhD, soldiers in the treatment condition exhibited better scores and higher rates of growth on standardized testing that measured resilience and psychological health (R/PH). In other words, formal training providing the building blocks of resilience and psychological growth yields positive outcomes and, in turn, makes us more resilient.
Regardless Where You Fall On The Curve…
Considering we all fall somewhere on the curve, there is always the opportunity to put in the work to shift ourselves more to the right, and to more of a growth mindset. The actual numbers on formal scales are not absolutely required. Consider your baseline, and then look to the outcomes of the US Army studies referenced above. Targeted, consistent work builds a more resilient mindset, and ultimately puts us in a stronger position when we are confronted with life’s inevitable traumas.
