Resilience to Interpersonal Trauma and Decreased Risk for Psychopathology in an Epidemiologic Sample

The role of resilience in the relationship between stress and alcohol

Stress plays a well-documented role in alcohol consumption and the risk for developing alcohol use disorder. The concept of resilience - coping with and successfully adapting to stressful life experiences - has received increasing attention in the field of addiction research in recent decades, and there has been an accumulation of evidence for resilience as a protective factor against problematic alcohol consumption, risk for alcohol use disorder, disorder severity, and relapse. The conceptual and methodological approaches used in the generation of this evidence vary considerably across investigations, however. In light of this, we carried out this review in order to provide a more thorough understanding of the meaning and scope of resilience, what factors contribute to resilience, how it is measured, and how it relates to alcohol-associated phenotypes. Implications for treatment through the use of resilience-building interventions are likewise discussed, as well as implications for future research on the role of resilience in the etiology and clinical outcomes of alcohol use disorder.

Resilience and alcohol use in adulthood in the United States: A scoping review

High levels of alcohol use and the development of alcohol use disorder (AUD) are associated with various adverse consequences. Resilience has been proposed as a protective factor against increased alcohol use, though the existing research is limited by inconsistencies in the conceptualization and measurement of resilience. As such, the current scoping review examined 14 studies on individual, trait-level resilience as a protective factor against alcohol use and related consequences in adults over the age of 21 in the United States. Findings from the included studies generally suggest resilience as a protective factor against various outcomes, though methodological limitations should be considered. Although future research in this area should improve upon methodological limitations, the present review suggests clinical implications of resilience as beneficial in prevention and intervention programming for alcohol use outcomes.

Childhood abuse/neglect and temporal patterns in late-life anxiety

OBJECTIVES

Anxiety has been associated with childhood abuse/neglect, but this relationship and its mechanisms are poorly documented in older adults. This study examined the association between childhood abuse/neglect and late-life anxiety temporal patterns (i.e. absence, remission, incidence, persistence), testing for mediators.

METHODS

Data were derived for 724 French-speaking community-living older adults participating in the Étude sur la santé des ainés - Services study with available information at baseline and 4-year follow-up. Past-month anxiety was based on a cutoff score ≥5 on a French translation of the 7-item Generalized Anxiety Disorder at interviews. Questions on childhood abuse/neglect (e.g. psycho-emotional, physical, sexual) were administered. Adjusted multinomial regression analyses and mediation bootstrapping models were used. Tested mediators included traumatic events (excluding childhood abuse/neglect), daily hassles, psychological resilience, and cortisol activity.

RESULTS

The absence, remission, incidence and persistence of anxiety was found in 45.3%, 25.3%, 8.7% and 20.7% of the sample, respectively. Participants with incident and persistent late-life anxiety experienced more childhood abuse/neglect. Participants with persistent anxiety also reported lower psychological resilience. The association between childhood abuse/neglect with anxiety incidence was mediated by daily hassles, while its association with anxiety persistence was mediated by daily hassles and psychological resilience.

CONCLUSION

Past childhood abuse/neglect was associated with late-life anxiety incidence and persistence, with psychological resilience and daily hassles potentially explaining this relationship. Further research should focus on ascertaining the clinical applications of psychosocial and biological profiles in informing the prevention and personalized treatment of anxiety in older adults.

Cardiovascular risk as a moderator of associations among anxiety sensitivity, distress tolerance, PTSD and depression symptoms among trauma-exposed firefighters

BACKGROUND

Firefighters experience frequent and severe trauma exposure, which places them at elevated risk for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and major depression. Cardiovascular issues may exacerbate the effects of mental health risk factors, such as anxiety sensitivity (AS) and distress tolerance (DT), on PTSD and depression. The current study investigated cardiovascular risk as a moderator of associations between risk factors (AS and DT) and psychiatric symptoms (PTSD and depression) among firefighters.

METHODS

Participants were 836 trauma-exposed active duty firefighters (93.90% men; with mean age 38 years, [SD = 9]). Participants endorsing at least one of three cardiovascular risk items-experiencing current high blood pressure, history of heart problems, and experiencing chest pains in the past 2 years-were considered high in cardiovascular risk.

RESULTS

A structural equation model indicated that higher AS was associated with greater PTSD (β = 0.38, p < .01) and depression symptoms (β = 0.32, p < .01); lower DT was associated with greater PTSD (β = -0.18, p < .01) and depression symptoms (β = -0.31, p < .01). Multigroup analyses showed that cardiovascular risk moderated the association between 1) AS and PTSD symptoms, but not 2) AS and depression symptoms, 3) DT and PTSD symptoms, or 4) DT and depression symptoms. For those high in cardiovascular risk, higher AS was associated more strongly with greater PTSD symptoms (high cardiovascular risk group: β = 0.46, p < .01]; low cardiovascular risk group: β = 0.33, p < .01).

CONCLUSIONS

High cardiovascular risk may contribute to PTSD symptoms among trauma-exposed firefighters with high AS. These results highlight the importance of considering physical and mental health vulnerabilities in first responder populations.

Short-Term and Long-Term Resilience Among At-Risk Adolescents: The Role of Family and Community Settings

Objective: Given the severe consequences associated with maltreatment, establishing an understanding of pathways to resilience among trauma-exposed youth is a critical public health aim. Longitudinal research has either examined short-term or long-term responses to traumatic events, which prevents testing for a) individual differences between resilience subtypes and b) consistency of short-term, resilient responses over time. Additionally, post-traumatic stress and depression represent the two most common symptom patterns in youth exposed to maltreatment, however few studies have simultaneously investigated resilience to these outcomes. In response, the current study employs a dimensional analytic approach to distinguish between short-term (the ability to demonstrate adaptive responses to ongoing adversities) and long-term (lack of distress over several years in response to a prior adversity) resilience. Consistent with an ecological perspective, the study examines whether family- and community-level protective factors are similarly or uniquely associated with different resilience subtypes.Method: Participants included 943 individuals (469 male, 474 female) from a nationally-representative, at-risk sample of adolescents who completed self-report measures of maltreatment exposure, depressive symptoms and post-traumatic stress symptoms at ages 12, 16, and 18. During the age 12 visit, participants' caregivers completed self-report measures of family routines and neighborhood social cohesion.Results: Overall, we found that family routines uniquely buffered against trauma-related distress across resilience conceptualizations, while social cohesion played a role in short-term resilience to depressive symptoms (p <.05). Participant gender did not moderate these results (p > .05).Conclusion: These findings highlight the importance of understanding resilience dimensionally for adolescents exposed to maltreatment.