resilience.bangor.ac.uk

Resilience is receiving increasing interest across policy, practice and research in relation to its potential impact on health, well-being and quality of life. As part of the Lifelong Health and Well-Being Programme, the Medical Research Council is particularly interested in the interaction between determinants of healthy ageing, and to improve our understanding of the interplay between factors that influence healthy ageing, resilience and well-being.

But there is little consensus regarding definitions and measurements of resilience, nor on debates about the factors that contribute to its’ maintenance or reduction. In particular, there is limited information regarding the developmental pattern of resilience over the life-course:

Is resilience something about the community in which a person lives which makes them resilient, or is there a biological predisposition?

Is resilience a psychological resource that is developed over the lifespan, or does it develop from exposure to difficulties or risks, enabling a person to develop the capacity to ‘bounce-back’?

Do resiliency factors in childhood affect resilience to challenges and inequalities in older age?

Resilience could be the key to understanding resistance to risk across the lifespan and how health and well-being can be maintained in the face of challenges. The potential importance of resilience is considerable. However in order to inform future research more clarity is required. Investigation is needed to understand how resilience can be promoted. Recognising this need, the MRC recently funded a network to take forward these questions.

The Resilience Network (ResNet) will unite and build upon previous research and work undertaken on resilience, and strengthen this with new perspectives and collaborations, thereby enhancing research capacity and development. The disciplines and organisations represented within the network represent a unique, biopsychosocial partnership of academics and stakeholders with an interest in exploring resilience in both younger and older people. An important part of the network will be the contribution of stakeholders. Representatives from organisations such as Age Concern and Whizz Kidz, local policy makers and service users will ensure that the academic output is meaningful and is universally useful and understood by all sectors. This also enables stakeholder expertise in healthy ageing and policy to be extended into national and international research and translation.

The Network will draw on this diverse expertise to develop research, knowledge transfer and dissemination strategies and subsequent research bids. These will take a multi-level approach and consider the complex interplay between places people live, the support they receive, biological and psychological characteristics on resilience and healthy ageing. The work will generate new knowledge for research, policy and practice, which will be accomplished through activities within 3 related work-packages. This is currently ongoing and the project will run until March 2010.

Each work package consists of meetings of researchers, service users and lay members, and research activity with outputs appropriate for all who may be interested. Multiple pathways of dissemination will ensure that the work is accessible to a wide range of recipients. By taking this focused approach to the topic, the Network expects to have a substantial research proposal ready at the end of their funding period. Reducing the consequences of ill health through approaches that consider both the individual at different stages of development, and the wider social aspects is paramount for productivity and healthy, active ageing across the lifespan.