The Science of Resilience Interventions for Children Exposed to Disasters

A white paper prepared for the June 10-11, 2013 workshop on Disaster Preparedness, Response and Recovery Considerations for Children and Families, hosted by the Institute of Medicine’s Forum on Medical and Public Health Preparedness for Catastrophic Events. 

This white paper considers the current science and practice of resilience interventions for children and youth who are susceptible to disasters or who have been exposed to disasters. This paper reviews the ways in which resilience research has influenced resilience interventions, considers specific illustrations of these resilience practices, and examines the evidentiary base for these activities. Furthermore, the authors will place these disaster-related resilience interventions within a public health framework of primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention.

Public health may have entered the field of resilience interventions rather late in the game, but its community-based practice orientation and methods for assessing programmatic effectiveness and theoretical construct fidelity can offer powerful tools to this burgeoning field of “interventional resilience.” Lastly, the authors explore the inherent challenges of developing evidence-based resilience practices within the context of disasters.