In Search of Family Resilience

Abstract

This study explores the construct of family resilience defined as a family variable that enables the family to survive major life challenges and as a coping resource that enables the individual to deal with traumas and to thrive from the experience. Nurses who were working with infected patients in a major epidemic in Singapore provided the sample and the context to search for family resilience. Two studies are reported in this article: Study 1 consisted of an in-depth interview with 30 nurses and some of their family members to identify the factors within their families that they perceived to have enabled them to cope with the stress and difficulties. Based on the results from Study 1, a family resilience (FR) scale was constructed. Using the FR scale, Study 2 employed a structured survey to identify the internal organization and the psychometric properties of FR. Factor analysis of the results identified five meaningful factors. The FR scale was found to have excellent psychometric properties. Path analyses were conducted to test whether family resilience is a spurious factor and whether it is a construct distinct and independent from individual resilience (IR). It was found that FR predicts individual well-being with both direct and indirect effect mediated by individual resilience, supporting the nonspurious nature of FR and the potential reciprocal causal effects between FR and IR.