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Resilient Individuals Reform Their Assumptive Worlds after Stressful Life Events

dc.contributor.advisorSmith, Craig (Craig Alexander)
dc.contributor.advisorKirby, Leslie D. (Leslie Deneen)
dc.contributor.advisorSaylor, Megan
dc.contributor.authorKramer, Lindsay B.
dc.date.accessioned2012-04-14T19:30:03Z
dc.date.available2012-04-14T19:30:03Z
dc.date.issued2012-04-11
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/1803/5075
dc.descriptionIndividuals develop core attitudes and beliefs that bring a sense of reality and purpose to their lives. After a stressful life event, these attitudes and beliefs are questioned. One is forced to learn to cope and reevaluate these assumptions. By using a survey, I looked at specifically at how individuals determined resilient coped with the event and achieved positive growth and transformation. This thesis was completed for PSY 296B, Honors Seminar, with Professor Megan Saylor.en_US
dc.description.abstractIndividuals develop core attitudes and beliefs that bring a sense of reality and purpose to their lives. They make up one’s assumptive world. After a particular trauma or stressful life event, one’s assumptive world is disrupted because individuals are confronted with inconsistent data that cannot be readily assimilated with their preexisting assumptions. Thus, he or she is forced to learn to cope with the situation and reappraise, or reevaluate, his or her core attitudes and beliefs. Successful coping and flexible adaption to changing demands of stressful experiences is referred to as psychological resilience. By using a survey that questioned participants about a stressful event, I hypothesized that resilient individuals would utilize accommodative-focused coping to maintain their assumptions and be able to achieve positive growth and transformation. It was found that resilient individuals maintained all assumptions, except in believing that the world is still meaningful. In addition, resilience was found to be predictive of using accommodative-focused coping and of experiencing positive growth after a stressful event. Thus, this research implies that a resilient individual is unable to justify why the event occurred to a decent and worthy person.en_US
dc.description.sponsorshipThesis completed in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the Honors Program in Psychological Sciencesen_US
dc.language.isoen_USen_US
dc.publisherVanderbilt Universityen_US
dc.subjectResilienceen_US
dc.subjectCopingen_US
dc.subjectAssumptive Worlden_US
dc.subject.lcshStress (Psychology)en_US
dc.subject.lcshAdjustment (Psychology)en_US
dc.subject.lcshResilience (Personality trait)en_US
dc.titleResilient Individuals Reform Their Assumptive Worlds after Stressful Life Eventsen_US
dc.title.alternativeResilient individualsen_US
dc.typeThesisen_US
dc.description.schoolVanderbilt Universityen_US
dc.description.departmentPsychological Sciencesen_US


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