RESILIENCE AND
COPING IN
OUTDOOR EDUCATION
A presentation
by
Jessie Booth &
James Neill
19th National
Outdoor Education
Conference, March
3 0 , 2 01 6 U n i v e r s i t y
of Sunshine Coast,
Queensland,
Australia.
!
THIS PRESENTATION WILL:
 Introduce psychological theory about stress, coping
and resilience.
 Review research about coping strategies and
resilience in outdoor education (OE).
 Explore how OE can use coping
strategies to contribute to the
development of resilience.
RESILIENCE – RELATED CONCEPTS
 H ardiness
 Resourcefulness
 M ental toughness
PSYCHOLOOGICAL RESILIENCE
 Capacity for adapting well in the face of tragedy,
trauma, threats or significant stress
(American Psychological Association, 2010)
 Bouncing back from a challenging experience
(Smith et al., 2008)
 Conceptualisation has changed from being a special,
invulnerable characteristic of some individuals to a
normal achievable and basic human adaptation
system.
RESILIENCE – SOURCES
Antecedent → Adversity
(e.g., experiences that are difficult
to adjust to)
some types of risk
make individuals
vulnerable
Coping
protective factors
lessen an individuals
response to adversity
(or make them more
resilient)
Response → Positive adaptation
(e.g., behavioural competencies that are
symptoms of internal well-being)
COPING
 Coping = behavioural and cognitive attempts to
manage stress (Carpenter, 1992)
 Diverse range of coping skills enables healthy
adaptation.
 Transactional model of stress and coping
(Lazarus & Folkman, 1987)
1.  Primary appraisal = perception of a threat as irrelevant/benign or
stressful.
2.  Secondary appraisal = selecting a response to the threat to best
manage it.
COPING
 3 main categories of coping responses
(Folkman & Lazarus, 1980) :
  Problem-focused
  Emotion-focused
  Avoidant
  We should be cautious about
labelling particular coping
strategies as positive or negative
because each may be effective in
particular situations.
COPING & RESILIENCE
 S tress Inoculation Model
  Similar to development of immunity against disease
  Small dosages of stress allow the system to build resilience
Stress
Challenge
(Stress-inducing
experience)
Coping
Resilience
Adaptive
coping
behaviour
Increased
resilience and
adaptability
STUDY 1 – COPING INTERVENTION
( S T E I N H A R DT & D O L B I E R , 2 0 0 8 )
  Psychoeducation sessions (x4) for stressed uni students:
  resilience and stress models, coping strategies, responsibility,
changing disempowering interpretations, creating meaningful
connections, and self-leadership
  Results (compared to control group):
  Significantly higher resilience scores
  Greater use of problem-focused coping strategies
  Lower use of avoidant coping strategies
  Techniques to develop coping (what we can do in OE):
  Psychoeducation
  Change environment/ stressor to test and practice responses
  Coping effectiveness training and practice
OE AS A RESILIENCE INTERVENTION
  Unfamiliar, wilderness environments
  Challenging nature of adventure activities
  Guided facilitation of experiences
  Group dynamics
  In theory, this can create constructive anxiety or dissonance
  Participants are required to engage coping strategies and
therefore build resilience
  Generally positive but variable results in studies examining
change in resilience through OE programs
RESILIENCE &
OUTDOOR EDUCATION STUDIES
  Neill and Dias (2001): Adult par ticipants in a 22-day Outward Bound
Australia program
(large change: d = 1 .10, N = 41)
  Shellman (2009): Youth par ticipants in 14 to 30 day Outward Bound
USA programs
(large change: d = 0.87, N = 63)
  Hayhurst, Hunter, Kafka, & Boyes (2015): Youth par ticipants in a 10day New Zealand sail training voyage
(moderate change: d = 0.59, N = 66)
  Ewer t & Yoshino (2011). US college students outdoor adventure
education semester program
(moderate change: d = 0.40, N = 66)
  However, other studies have found no significant changes:
  Sheard and Golby (2006): 26 university students in UK for a 3-month outdoor
adventure education curriculum.
  Skehill (2001): 99 adolescents in initial 5-week period of residential program
that combined outdoor education with traditional school curriculum.
COPING & RESILIENCE IN OUTDOOR ED
(BOOTH, 2015)
 I nvestigated development of psychological
resilience and the contribution of different
coping strategies
 O utward Bound program for adolescents
 M ixed method
(quantitative &
qualitative)
BRIEF RESILIENCE SCALE
(SMITH ET AL., 2008)
 I tend to bounce back quickly after hard times.
 I have a hard time making it through stressful
events. (R)
 It does not take me long to recover from a
stressful event.
 It is hard for me to snap back when something
bad happens. (R)
 I usually come through difficult times with little
trouble.
 I tend to take a long time to get over set-backs in
my life. (R)
CHANGE IN RESILIENCE
FOR EACH PARTICIPANT
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49
-0.5
-1
-1.5
-2
Series
RESULTS - CHANGE IN RESILIENCE
QUANTITATIVE: Small increase in resilienceeffect size= .2 (small)
  Positive change
  Typical of OE/Resilience results
Strongly disagree
Disagree
Neutral
Agree
Strongly Agree
Time1 Time2
QUALITATIVE: over half 14 interviewed participants had positive changes
in resilience.
COPE
(CARVER ET AL., 1989)
COPING
STRATEGIES
DURING AN OE
PROGRAM
Resilience-enhancing
Resilience-undermining
Average overall use of
strategy
4= a lot
3= a medium amount
2= a little bit
1= not at all
RESULTS – CONTRIBUTION OF COPING TO
CHANGE IN RESILIENCE
3 coping strategies partially explained change in
resilience:
  Qualitative data showed greater use of:
  Positive Reinterpretation:
Construing a stressful transaction in positive terms
e.g., “I learnt something from the experience.”
  Quantitative data showed lower use of:
  Acceptance:
Accepting the reality of a stressful situation
e.g., I learnt to live with it.
  Focus on and Venting of Emotions:
Focusing on what is distressing or upsetting and ventilating those feelings
e.g., I felt a lot of emotional distress and found myself expressing those
feelings a lot.
predicted greater positive changes in resilience
CONCLUSION
  Resilience is a core psychological outcome targetted by
outdoor education programs
  There is positive but varied evidence about effect of OE
on participants’ resilience levels.
  Psychological theory suggests coping strategies can
influence development of resilience.
  Thus, to improve outcomes of OE programs, consider:
  Greater integration of psychoeducation to help guide participants’
coping strategy skill and choices
  Facilitators can be influential in teaching, facilitating, and role
modeling use of adaptive coping skills
  Specially target:
  Positive reinterpretation (↑)
  Acceptance (↓)
  Focus on and venting of emotion (↓)
FURTHER INFO AND CONTACTS
  jessiewbooth@gmail.com
  james.neill@canberra.edu.au
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