Running Head: INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS An Investigation of Connections between Resilience, Cognitive Processing Propensities and
Personality Traits
Heidi A.E. Baldwin-Kirchhoff and Pamela I. Ansburg
Metropolitan State University of Denver
Author Note
This research was supported by a 2013-14 CUR/Psi Chi Summer Research Grant. Any opinions,
findings, or conclusions within this work are those of the authors and not necessarily the views
of the Psi Chi The International Honors Society in Psychology.
INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS Abstract
Resilience is the ability to maintain or regain mental health in the face of hardship (e.g, Wu et al.,
2013). The current work reports two studies assessing whether the basic cognitive processes of
reappraisal and inhibition underlie resiliency. Study 1 assessed whether reappraisal ability
increased resilience. A total of 66 college students, under various reappraisal instruction
conditions, viewed a negatively emotionally-charged video (Malooly et al., 2013). A paired t-test
comparing post-viewing moods across the reappraisal instruction conditions showed null results
(p = .948), and prevented a test of the primary hypothesis. However, exploratory analyses
revealed significant relationships between Resilience, Extraversion and Neuroticism, and mood
(correlations ranged from r = -.26 to .56, p < .05). The second study tested whether those who
show strong inhibitory skills for irrelevant neutral and emotional stimuli would show high
resiliency. Performance on traditional and emotional Stroop tasks indicated 126 college students’
ability to inhibit interfering stimuli. Resilience failed to predict interference scores for either
Stroop task (p >.05). Resilience predicted both Extraversion and Neuroticism, r(115) = .40, p <
.01 and r(112) = -.43, p < .01 respectively. Limitations of the present work leave open the
question of how basic cognitive processes influence resilience.
2 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS Investigation of Resilience, Cognitive Processes and Personality Traits
Every human experiences stressful events from time to time. The personality trait of
resilience enables individuals to bounce back after emotionally stressful and challenging
experiences (Gross, 1998; Malooly, Genet, & Siemer, 2013; McLarnon & Rothstein, 2013;
Smith, Tooley, Christopher & Kay, 2010; Wu et al., 2013). Resilience enhances individuals’
coping abilities and increases one’s overall sense of well-being. Resilience is the ability to adapt,
maintain, or regain mental health in the face of hardship (Herrman et al., 2011; Lu, Wang, Liu, &
Zhang, 2014). For example, imagine that an individual worked on a sales proposal for a large
account to find that after a year of meetings and negotiations the deal fell through. Some
individuals would mentally reinforce feelings of failure by ruminating over the details of the
negative event. These individuals who reinforce negative emotions are more likely to persist in a
negative emotional state and tend to have higher neuroticism levels. On the other hand, resilient
individuals still feel some negative emotions related to the event, but would adapt more quickly
after failure and regain a positive or neutral emotional state. These more resilient individuals
tend to have higher extraversion levels and more positive affect. Because resilience contributes
to mental health it is important to understand if it can be developed or increased through training.
The present work endeavors to test if the cognitive factors of reappraisal and inhibition positively
relate and contribute to individual resilience levels.
The personality traits of neuroticism and extraversion are both predictive of individual
resilience. Neuroticism is a propensity to feel negative affect such as anxiety, sorrow,
humiliation, anger and blame (Jeronimus, Ormel, Aleman, Penninx, & Riese, 2013; Lu et al.,
2014). It is important to note that mild negative affect can increase some cognitive functions
such as inhibition, while more severe negative affect can cause great difficulty in the ability to
3 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS inhibit a negative emotional response (Schmeichel & Tang, 2015). Neuroticism has been shown
to be negatively correlated to resilience (Lu et al., 2014). In other words, if one tends to
experience more negative emotions then resilience is lower for this individual. On the other
hand, individuals with high extraversion tend to experience more positive affect such as
pleasurable social interactions, vivacity, and enthusiasm (Watson, Clark, & Tellegen, 1988).
Positive affect increases some cognitive processes such as the ability to switch from one task to
another (Schmeichel & Tang, 2015). For example, an individual with high positive affect would
be better able to quickly and competently adapt when presented with different situations. Positive
affect is positively related to resilience (Cheng & Furnham, 2003; Lu et al., 2014). In other
words the more positive affect an individual experiences the higher their resilience level.
Cognitive Processes, Personality Propensities and Resilience
Cognitive flexibility is the ability to shift, modify, or inhibit thoughts to accomplish a
goal within a situation (Genet & Siemer, 2011; Malooly et al., 2013). When faced with problems,
individuals who are cognitively flexible avoid getting stuck in an unproductive mental rut; and
instead, generate alternative strategies. Individuals who are less cognitively flexible are less able
to inhibit or switch thoughts and tend to remain in the same thought pattern. The lowered ability
to be cognitively flexible results in a weaker ability to generate new strategies when faced with a
challenge. Those who demonstrate resiliency to overcome life challenges and maintain overall
well-being show cognitive and affective flexibility (Genet & Siemer, 2011), it seems likely that
flexibility is involved in resilient thinking. Cognitive flexibility involves the abilities to: 1)
inhibit the intrusion of irrelevant or misleading information and 2) shift the course of one’s
thinking to avoid fixed mental states. Cognitive flexibility involves inhibiting the tendency to
focus on obstacles and allows individuals to switch to more adaptive mental tactics (Genet &
4 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS Siemer, 2011). To explain further, cognitive flexibility gives individuals the ability to mentally
shift from one task to a different task. For example, if a student in a classroom is asked to work
on their spelling for a portion of a morning. After an hour, the teacher asks the class to put away
their spelling and begins a math lesson. Individuals who have better cognitive flexibility will find
switching to a new task easier than those with lower cognitive flexibility skill.
Affective flexibility refers to the circumstance in which the inhibitory and shifting
processes are applied to emotional content. Flexible affective processing helps individuals to
maintain emotional equilibrium while experiencing emotionally charged events by avoiding
negative emotions and switching to a more positive viewpoint. For example, imagine an
individual received a criticism from a close friend, and begins to feel hurt by the comment. Our
individual then realizes their friend is just in a bad mood and shifts from the feelings of hurt to
more neutral emotions. In this instance, the individual is displaying affective flexibility. The
ability to be affectively flexible suggests the ability to process emotional information in a
malleable way. Because cognitive and affective flexibility enables individuals to inhibit
maladaptive responses and switch to more adaptive mental tactics, both should contribute to
resilient responding (Genet & Siemer, 2011).
The present work investigated the role of reappraisal and inhibition, and how these
cognitive processes are related to resilience. Reappraisal empowers an individual to reduce the
effect and significance of a situation by transforming the impact of the negative event (Gross,
1998; Troy, Wilhelm, Shallcross, & Mauss, 2010). In other words, cognitive reappraisal is the
ability to refocus on a different thought rather than on the reactive thought. When individuals can
apply reappraisal processes to emotional content they can adaptively shift an emotional response
to an event (Malooly et al., 2013). In this instance, flexibility increases individual ability to
5 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS change the meaning of the incident when experiencing an emotional event. As an example of
emotional reappraisal, say someone views a disturbing news report and immediately feels a
stressful emotion. Individuals who are emotionally flexible and able to reappraise are better able
to quickly change their emotional response to a more neutral or positive state. Those who can
show affective flexibility and reappraise emotional situations are better able to recognize a
negative emotional reaction and then change thoughts and therefore change their response to an
event (Malooly et al., 2013; Troy et al., 2010). Malooly et al. (2013) found that individual
differences in the ability to reappraise an emotional situation could be accounted for by
differences in cognitive and affective flexibility. The current study tests whether resilience is
positively related to cognitive and/or emotional reappraisal.
Inhibition
Inhibition is the cognitive process that involves affective inhibition and cognitive
inhibition. Affective inhibition is the ability to stop an emotional response to a stressor and
cognitive inhibition enables individuals to block out unrelated information and maintain selfawareness (Genet & Siemer, 2011). Inhibition is a skill that enables individuals to restrain their
response to an event. For example, imagine that an individual is working on an email to his/her
supervisor, and another employee begins yelling in the hallway. The ability to cognitively inhibit
would enable the individual to completely ignore the irrelevant outburst in the hallway while
they finish an important email. This situation is an example of cognitive inhibition. To explain
further, imagine that the outburst in the hallway contains an emotionally charged comment
directed towards our individual, in this case the individual would also need to prevent his/her
emotional response to the comment to finish the important email. This experience is an example
of emotional inhibition. The ability to inhibit a reaction to an event contributes to an individual’s
6 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS cognitive and affective flexibility (Genet & Siemer, 2011). Individuals who exhibit cognitive and
affective flexibility are also likely to possess high levels of resilience (Genet & Siemer, 2011).
Genet and Siemer (2011) used “task-switching” problems to measure individual cognitive and
affective flexibility and measured how these cognitive processes contribute to resilience. The
method used in the Genet and Siemer (2011) study required participants to use both inhibitory
and shifting processes; thus, their work did not determine the separate contributions of inhibition
and shifting processes to predicting resiliency. Further, some of their findings suggested that
inhibition is likely the stronger predictor of resiliency than is shifting skill. The goal of the
present work is to test whether inhibition is a predictor of resilience.
Study 1
The present work investigates whether the ability to reappraise predicts individual
resilience levels. Those who reappraise adverse events can shift emotional responses to more
neutral ones. Study 1 tests reappraisal ability by showing participants an emotionally charged
video while asking them to reduce their emotional response or to view the clip unregulated. The
hypothesis for study 1 is that those with strong ability to reappraise will also show increased
resilience levels.
Method
Participants.
In the reappraisal study, participants were 41 female and 25 male college students whose ages
ranged from 18 to 41 (M = 24.08, SD = 5.68). The participants were 6 seniors, 20 juniors, 20
sophomores, and 19 were freshmen. Ethnic makeup was 77% White, 9% African American,
7 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS 22.4% Hispanic, and 20.5% other ethnic category.1 In exchange for their time, participants
earned points for their Introduction to Psychology course.
Materials and Procedure.
Some of the materials and methods for the current study replicated portions of the Malooly,
Genet, and Siemer (2013) study. In the current work, each participant completed the study
individually on a computer in a private cubicle. For each data collection session, there were
enough computers and cubicles to run 14 individuals simultaneously. After reading the informed
consent information, participants answered demographic questions and completed a baseline
assessment of their current emotional state. To measure participants’ baseline emotional state
they rated the extent to which emotional words such as “depressed” and “content”, on a 7-point
Likert scale indicated their current emotional state. A rating of 1 indicated that the word was “not
at all” their current emotional state and 7 indicated that the word fit their current emotional state
“a great deal” (Malooly et al., 2013). Participants then completed The Eysenck Personality
Questionnaire: Brief Version (Sato, 2005) to determine individual levels of neuroticism and
extraversion personality traits. This neuroticism and extraversion measure asked participants to
rate phrases on a scale of 1 (not at all) to 5 (extremely). For example the phrase “Are you rather
lively?” measured extraversion and “Are you a worrier?” measured neuroticism (Sato, 2005).
Participants then completed the Connor-Davidson Resiliency Scale (CD-RISC; Connor &
Davidson, 2003) to measure individual levels of resilience. Participants indicated how much they
agreed with statements such as “Having to cope with stress can make me stronger” on a 5-point
scale. In the Connor-Davidson Resiliency Scale a rating of 1 indicated that participants felt the
1
Participants reported all ethnic groups that applied to their ethnicity, allowing participants to report shared ethnic backgrounds. The ability to report all ethnicities that applied to the participants ethnic backgrounds is why the percentage total is greater than 100%. 8 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS statement was “not true at all” and 5 indicated they felt the statement was “true nearly all the
time”.
After completing these measures, participants received information that they would be
watching a short film clip and that they would receive instructions about how to view the film
clip. Per Malooly et al. (2013), all participants read that they would be shown either a "view
unregulated" or "decrease emotion" instruction prior to the film. Participants were randomly
assigned to one of three instruction conditions; two "decrease emotion" groups and one "view
unregulated" group. The participants in the "decrease emotion” group were divided into either
the "reappraisal with regular instructions" group or the “reappraisal with counter-demand
instruction” group. Those in the “reappraisal with regular instructions” received instructions to
view the film while trying to block their feelings about the film, while the "reappraisal with
counter demand instructions" group received instruction to try to block their feelings but to be
aware that sometimes trying to block feelings actually resulted in the counterintuitive outcome of
feeling emotions more intensely. The participants who saw the "view unregulated" cues are those
considered to be in the “reactivity control group”. These participants received instructions asking
them to attempt to fully experience any emotions that arise while watching the film.
Participants then watched a 2:44 minute film clip from the film "The Champ"(Lovell,
Marion, & Zeffrelli, 1979). While they viewed the clip either the "view unregulated" or
"decrease emotion" instruction was displayed on the screen. Post-video all participants
completed an 18-word post emotional state measure to indicate their mood after viewing the clip.
Participants rated such words as “cheerful” and “ sad” on a scale from 1 which indicated they felt
that mood “very slightly or not at all” to 5 which indicated they felt that mood “extremely”
(Malooly, personal communication, March 21, 2014).
9 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS Finally participants complete a short emotion-regulation follow-up questionnaire about
their experience (Malooly et al., 2013). This questionnaire was designed to help understand the
emotion participants may have felt while watching the video. For the “view unregulated” group
participants indicated how much sadness they felt during the clip and to indicate this on a 1 to 7
scale, 1 being the “least emotion” rating and 7 being the “most emotion” rating. The “view
unregulated” group also indicated what they did during the video. The “decrease emotion”
groups rated on a scale from 1 to 7 how difficult they felt “decreasing their emotions” would be,
how successful they were at “feeling less emotion” and “how much sadness did they feel during”
the clip. These two groups then indicated if they received information that decreasing emotions
would be hard. Finally, both groups explained what they did to decrease their emotions during
the clip.
Results/Discussion
Preliminary data were screened using an instruction check item on which participants
indicated which viewing cue they had been asked to follow prior to viewing the video. The
answer to this question was used to determine if participants understood the viewing instruction.
The participants who correctly identified the viewing instructions they received were included in
further analysis. In addition, one participant was removed from the data set as the participant
answered every question with a “1”. This resulted in 66 valid participants for analysis.
An independent samples t-test indicated no significant difference in post-sadness ratings
between the “decrease emotions” group and the “decrease emotions with counter demand
instructions" allowing for these to be combined into one group for further analysis, (t(64) = 1.76,
p = .08). In total, the two groups included 22 in the “view normally” group and 44 in the
“decrease emotion” group. To test if post-video sadness ratings differed between groups an
10 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS independent samples t-test was used. The independent samples t-test indicated no significant
difference in sadness ratings between the “view normally” and “decrease emotions” groups, t
(64) = 1.76, p = .67. This result suggests that the reappraisal instructions were ineffective. The
reappraisal level for the “view normally” group was about the same level as the “decrease
emotions” group. Without a significant reappraisal effect it was impossible to test whether those
who have better reappraisal ability would show higher levels of resilience.
However, exploratory analysis showed some interesting results in the correlations
between resilience and the personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism. The correlations
between scores of resilience, extraversion and neuroticism are in Table 1. Resilience scores were
positively correlated to extraversion; individuals who report higher resilience also showed
increased extraversion. This finding makes sense as extraversion and resilience tend to share
some level of positive affect. Resilience scores were negatively correlated to neuroticism. In
other words, as resilience scores increased then the personality trait of neuroticism decreased.
This means that individuals who show greater levels of negative affect tend to show lower
resilience levels. This result suggests extraversion is supportive of the ability to be resilient and
neuroticism is counterproductive to resilience ability. These results are consistent with previous
works indicating the role of resilience combined with extraversion can increase overall wellbeing (Lu et al., 2013).
Study 2
The second study was designed to examine the relationship between resilience and
inhibition extending the work of Genet and Siemer (2011). Participants completed all tasks on
individual computers using Medialab software that had integrated the reaction time tests using
the Medialab’s DirectRTsoftware. For each data collection session, there were enough computers
11 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS and cubicles to run 7 individuals simultaneously. To measure inhibition, participants completed
different versions of the Stroop task. The hypothesis for study 2 is that those who show high
levels of inhibition will also have higher resilience levels.
Method
Participants.
Participants for the second study were 82 female and 42 male MSU Denver students whose ages
ranged from 18 to 56 (M = 22.47, SD = 6.90). Ethnic makeup was 68% White, 10% African
American, 40% Hispanic and 28% other (see Footnote 1). The participants were 59 freshmen, 43
sophomores, 19 juniors, and 4 seniors. Of the total number of participants 88% considered
English their primary language.
Materials and Procedure.
After reading the informed consent information, participants completed some practice trials of
the Stroop test and then completed the traditional and emotional Stroop tasks. The traditional
Stroop task measured cognitive inhibition and the emotional Stroop task measured affective
inhibition. The traditional Stroop task requires participants to state the color of the font in which
a word was written rather than naming the word itself (Stroop, 1935). The task included
“congruent” trials in which words that name colors are the same color as the font (e.g., the word
yellow written out in yellow colored font) and in “incongruent” trials the color words were not
the same color (e.g., the word yellow written out in a green color). The emotional Stroop task
asked participants to name the color of the font in which the word was written when the word
was associated with an emotional response (Eide, Kemp, Silberstien, Nathan, & Stough, 2002).
In the traditional Stroop task, the correct response for the incongruent task was the color
of the font that the word was written in rather than the named word. The time it took participants
12 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS to name the font color in which the word was written was recorded. The difference between
reaction times from incongruent and congruent trials provided a measure of inhibitory skill. The
smaller the difference in reaction time, the better able the individual was to avoid the cognitive
interference that arose from the mismatch of the meaning of the word displayed and the color in
which the word was written.
The emotional Stroop presented positively valenced, negatively valenced, and nonemotive words and required participants to name the color of the font in which the word was
written. For example, if a participant saw the positively-valenced word “brave” (in red font), the
negatively valenced word “worried” (in red font), or the non-emotive word “bramble” (in red
font), the participant correctly responded with “red”. The emotional Stroop trials measured the
extent to which emotional content interfered with cognitive processing by comparing the reaction
time for color naming on the emotionally valenced trials against the reaction time on the nonemotive trials. The words used as stimuli for the emotional Stroop task are listed in Table 2
(Richards, French, Johnson, Naparstek, & Williams, 1992). In both tasks, inhibitory processes
were measured by the time it takes to name the color of the font and compared across trial types.
The Stroop task procedures used in the current work were adapted from Cothran and
Larsen, (2008). For both Stroop tasks, participants indicated the color of the font in which a word
was written using the numeric keypad. To indicate the font color participants used the number 8
key which was covered with a green color code label, the number 6 key was covered with a red
color code label, the number 4 key was covered with a blue color code label, and then number 2
key was covered with a yellow color code label. Trials within block did not proceed until
participants indicated their response with the correctly labeled key on the numeric keypad. The
neutral Stroop task included blocks of trials consisting of 60 trials per block. Participants each
13 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS complete three 60-trial blocks. The words “red”, “yellow”, “blue”, and “green” served as
stimuli. Each word was presented 15 times per font color on a black background (i.e., 60 trials
per block) and presentations of the stimuli were randomized within each block. Between each
block of trials, participants were given a 2 minute break. In the neutral Stroop task, there are
congruent and incongruent trials. In congruent trials, the word displayed is a color name that is
written in a font color that matches the color name (“red” in red font color). In incongruent
trials, the word displayed is a color name that is written in a font color that does not match the
color name (“green” in a font color of red). For both of these examples, the correct response is
“red”. The time it takes participants to name the font color in which the word is written is
recorded. The difference between reaction times to incongruent and congruent trials provides a
measure of inhibitory skill. The smaller the difference in reaction time, the better able the
individual is to avoid the cognitive interference that arises from the mismatch of the meaning of
the word displayed and the color in which the word is written.
Participants then completed the emotional Stroop task in four blocks. In Block 1
participants indicated the font color of 20 negatively valenced words, in Block 2 participants
indicated the font color of 20 neutral words, in Block 3 participants indicated the font color of 20
positively valenced words, and in Block 4 participants indicated the font color of 20 neutral
words. All blocks were followed by a 2 minute rest period. Neutral words in Block 2 and Block 4
contained non-emotional words that had the same number of letters as the corresponding
positively or negatively valenced words. The words were acquired from the work of Richards,
and colleagues, (1992). The columns in Table 2 correspond to the four blocks of the emotional
Stroop trials and list the stimuli presented in each trial. Within each block, each column of 20
words was presented three times (each time in a different color font); the order of presentation of
14 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS the words within each block was randomized. Each word appeared three times and each color
was presented equally across blocks.
For both types of Stroop trials participants received the following instructions “Ignore the
word and indicate the color of the font as quickly as possible by pressing the appropriate key on
keyboard.” All trials were separated by 350-ms during which a line of “x’s” were displayed in
the center of a black screen.
After completing the traditional and emotional Stroop, as in the first study, participants
completed the same Connor and Davidson resiliency scale (CD-RISC; Connor & Davidson,
2003), and the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire: Brief Version (Sato, 2005). Finally,
participants completed demographic questions and then read a debriefing statement after
completing all tasks.
Results/Discussion
The current inhibition study predicted that individuals who show a greater ability to
deploy inhibitory resources to counter interference from both emotional and neutral stimuli will
also show higher levels of personal resilience compared to those who have difficulty inhibiting
their responses to either type of stimuli.
In total, Study 2 included 124 valid data sets. However, those participants who did not
finish a particular test were removed from analysis for that test. A paired samples t-test analysis
determined there was a significant difference between reaction times for congruent words and
non-congruent words on the traditional Stroop task, (t(124) = 8.13, p < .01). This finding shows
that participants did have a longer reaction time to the words that were in a font color different
from the color word. For example, if a participant saw the written word blue in the font color of
red they took longer to enter the correct color. This finding replicates the classic Stroop effect. A
15 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS paired samples t-test analysis indicated there was no significant difference between the reaction
times for positive valence words and non-emotive words on the emotional Stoop task,
(t(123)=0.93, p = 0.356). This finding shows that participants did not take longer to react to a
positively valenced word compared to a non-emotive word. In other words, participants’ positive
affect did not impact inhibitory skill. A paired samples t-test did indicate a significant difference
in reaction time for negatively valenced words and non-emotive words, (t(123) = 4.03, p < .01).
This means that participants took longer to react to the negatively valenced word compared to
the non-emotive word. This suggests that interference did occur, that the meaning of the negative
word caused the participant to take longer to give the correct response. This interference is a
result of the time it takes the mind to react to the negative word and then stop the reaction in
order to respond to the question. Results for the inhibition study failed to support the hypothesis
that inhibition skills have a direct positive relationship with resilience. There was no correlation
between resilience and inhibition r(113) = .058, p = .537.
Exploratory analysis showed correlations for resilience, interference, extraversion and
neuroticism, and negatively valenced words (see Table 3). Resilience and inhibition were
unrelated. This finding shows that inhibition skill is not predictive of individual resilience levels.
Resilience was negatively correlated to neuroticism. This finding indicates that those with higher
resilience scores show lower neuroticism levels. Conversely, these results indicate that the higher
the level of individual neuroticism the lower the individual resilience level. In addition, results
show that extraversion and resilience were positively related. These results mean that those with
higher levels of extraversion also show higher levels of resiliency. These findings are consistent
with the first study and support previous works.
General Discussion
16 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS The results of these two separate and yet similar studies suggest that reappraisal and
inhibitory skills may not directly contribute to resilience. In Study 1, reappraisal instructions
were ineffective preventing a test of the primary hypothesis. In Study 2, inhibition skill did not
predict individual resilience levels. These current works do, however, add to recent findings that
extraversion and neuroticism are linked to individual resilience. Lu and colleagues, (2013) found
that resilience acts as a mediator between personality traits of extraversion and neuroticism. In
addition, several previous works demonstrate that extraversion is positively related to happiness
and neuroticism negatively correlated to happiness (Argyle & Lu, 1990; Cheng & Furnham,
2003; DeNeve & Cooper, 1998; Lu et al., 2013). The present work identifies extraversion as a
related trait to resilience and contributes to the findings that positive emotion and extraversion
may be mediated by resilience. Lu et al. (2013) found that resilience acts as a partial mediator
between extraversion, positive affect and individual happiness. To explain further, extraversion
as a personality trait impacts happiness through resilience (Lu et al., 2013). When present
together extraversion, resilience and positive affect are predictors of increased happiness and in
turn overall well-being.
The current work adds support to previous works indicating that neuroticism is related to
negative affect and does not increase resilience. However in those with more negative affect and
neuroticism, resilience training may prove effective in increasing overall well-being (Lu et al.,
2013). Neuroticism and negative affect are predictors of lower happiness and a reduced level of
well-being. The current work adds support to findings suggesting that personal resilience is an
important contributor in increasing overall well-being (Lu et al., 2013). Developing resilience in
those who have higher neuroticism levels also may help to improve their overall well-being.
17 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS Perhaps by developing tools to increasing positive affect and extraversion individuals can in turn
increase their personal resilience.
In the current work support for the cognitive influences inhibition or reappraisal on
resilience was not found. This finding however, does not mean that cognitive processes are not
contributors to overall well-being, as inhibition or reappraisal can lead to better overall positive
emotion. In Study 1, the reappraisal instructions were ineffective, perhaps clear and separate
reappraisal instructions should be given to each reappraisal group. In Study 2, participants
responded to traditional and emotional Stroop tasks to measure inhibition. Perhaps the Stroop
task is not the best way to test inhibition in relation to resilience. The extent to which cognitive
skill offers increases to the personality trait of resilience remains to be seen. Future research is
needed to examine whether or not cognitive skills contribute to individual levels of resilience.
Because positive affect is mediated by resilience perhaps other cognitive skills can indirectly
lead to increased resilience and overall well-being. Future research is also needed to determine if
other cognitive functions may have a stronger influence on resilience. However support of the
links between extraversion, neuroticism, and resilience warrants further research into how
resilience as a mediator can lead to increases in overall well-being. Finding cognitive behavioral
therapy interventions that increase extraversion and positive affect may prove useful, and in turn
impact individual resilience levels. The importance of resilience to overall mental health and
well-being warrants continued research on what specific mechanisms can be integrated into
clinical practice to improve individual resilience levels.
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22 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS 23 Table 1
Reappraisal Study Variables, Correlations, and Descriptive Statistics (N ranges from 62-67)
Variables
1
1. Resilience scores
-
2
3
4
5
2. Neuroticism scores
-.32*
-
3. Extraversion scores
.29*
-.20
-
4. Baseline sadness rating
-.26*
.48**
.05
-
5. Post-sadness rating
-.18
.39**
.22
.20
-
M
97.35
27.27
40.30
9.55
11.29
SD
11.59
9.73
8.46
3.96
4.32
Range
25-125
5-60
5-60
6-90
6-90
.90
.90
.81
.87
.87
α
*p< .05, **p< .01
Table 2
Words used in emotional Stroop task
INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS Anxiety related words
Anxiety matched
Happiness related
Happiness-matched
(negatively valenced)
words
words
words
(neutral & equivalent
(positively valenced)
(neutral & equivalent
letters)
letters)
Weak
Take
Optimistic
Typewriter
Worried
Bramble
Love
Ring
Agony
Verse
Brave
Stick
Panicky
Section
Successful
Profession
Failure
Clothes
Reassured
Carpenter
Nervous
Picture
Confident
Cardboard
Helpless
Interest
Strength
Building
Terrified
Margarine
Pleasure
Magnetic
Painful
Around
Happiness
Associate
Die
Cup
Ecstasy
Grounds
Sickness
Material
Healthy
Climate
Disease
Library
Homely
System
Tragedy
Whistle
Laughter
Inventor
Accident
Instead
Warmth
Corner
Suffering
Something
Overjoyed
Offspring
Cancer
Taller
Friendly
Alphabet
Paralyzed
Expensive
Security
Parallel
Despair
Service
Capable
Measure
Distressed
Understand
Good
Cord
24 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS Coffin
Lesser
Relaxed
Lighter
Note. Adapted from “Effects of mood manipulation and anxiety on performance of an emotional
Stroop task.” by A. Richards, C. C. French, W. Johnson, J. Naperstek, and J. Williams, 1992, British
Journal of Psychology, 83, p. 479.
25 INVESTIGATION OF RESILIENCE, COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND PERSONALITY TRAITS 26 Table 3
Inhibition Study Variables, Correlations, and Descriptive Statistics (N ranges from 112-125)
Variables
1
1. Resilience scores
-
2
3
4
5
2. Neuroticism scores
-.46**
-
3. Extraversion scores
.40**
-.23*
-
4. Interference
.06
-.16
.14
-
5. Negatively valenced words
.54
-.13
-.06
.03
-
M
99.58
28.73
41.72
17.11
691.37
SD
11.22
11.22
10.56
47.31
84.21
Range
25-125
5-60
5-60
-152.93-122.15
508.88-891.68
.88
.92
.82
-
-
α
*p< .05, **p< .01