Performance PsychologyMaintaining Wellbeing through the Resilience Lenses during CV-19Dr Irina Roncaglia PhD CPsychol AFBPsS

HCPC Registered Sport & Exercise Psychologist

Aims and Objectives

• Wellbeing Model

• Positive Emotions and their Role

• Defining Resilience

• How do we develop, nurture and maintain resilience

• Emotional-Regulation and Reframing

• Take Home Messages

Well-Being ModelSeligman M., 2011

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Benefits of Well-Being• Evidence shows that people with

positive well-being:

• Live longer

• Have less coronary heart disease

• Are more likely to survive cancer

• Show faster wound healing times

• Are less likely to succumb to a standard dose of virus

• Significance in current CV-19

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Positive Emotions

• Feeling good helps us to perform better in different domains - at work, when studying, when teaching.

• It boosts our physical health by strengthening the immune system.

• By strengthening our immune system, we are in a better position to fight off physical illnesses.

• Feeling good is contagious. Seeing smiles makes us want to smile. Hearing laughter makes us feel like laughing.

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Resilience – what is it and how can we nurture it?

Psychological Resilience

• Psychological resilience has been defined as “the role of mental processes and behaviour in promoting personal assets and protecting an individual from the potential negative effect of stressors”

• The emphasis is placed on neutral term ‘stressor’ rather than negative value-laden adversity.

• The focus is on promoting assets and protecting the individual from potential negative effects of stressors, rather than positive adaptation per se.

(Fletcher & Sarkar, 2012, p. 675, 2013, p. 16).

HOW CAN WE DEVELOP RESILIENCE?

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It’s possible that some people may be more biologically predisposed toward being resilient; but psychological and environmental factors can contribute to its development.

The good news is that resilience is not a trait that people either have or do not have – it involves thoughts, beliefs, attitudes and behaviours that can be learned and developed.

The Resilience Framework (adapted from Hart et al., 2007)

Basics

Belonging

Learning

Coping

Core self

Why is being resilient important?

Primary benefits

•Resilient people are not unaffected by life events, but they are better able to cope effectively withchallenges and stressors.

Secondary benefits

•Resilience is being ready, willing and able to lock onto learning and knowing how to work through challenges…

Building & developing resilience

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The ability to cope with

everyday setbacks and

challenges (minor stressors)

in academic working.

The ability to cope with

major challenges acting

upon professional working

whether acute or chronic.

If you can cope with minor adversities…

You are more likely to cope with major adversities…

And experience better outcomes

THE 3R OF RESILIENCE

• Recovery (from setback) • Resistance (inner strength)• Reconfiguration (rebuilding)

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Hardiness Construct (Maddi, S.R., 1999)

• A personality disposition that enhances performance, conduct, morale, stamina, and health.

• Commitment – to enjoy them

• Control – to feel that you have chosen them

• Challenge – a sense that you have or are learning from them, through transformational (hardy) coping

Key Messages:• ‘Stress’ can result in personal

growth

• Write your own rhythm

• Resilience as lenses to bouncing back

• Make decisions according to FACTS – not if scenarios

• STOP, START and CONTINUE

Building a resilient mind-set

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The role of feedback

Building emotional literacy

and regulation

Involving others Reframing events

Provide feedback

• Process feedback is specific and targeted (and is more effective than generalized feedback).

• Process feedback will also encourage us to develop a growth mindset: that with realistic and consistent work and effort we can be successful in anything we turn our minds to.

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Provide affirmations

• Resilient people tend to attribute successes internally (i.e. to themselves).

• Taking notice of the successes, strengths, talents and interests of individuals (pro dancers, or students) will build their resilience and confidence.

• Affirmations are positive statements about one’s identity (not their behaviour).

Celebrate mistakes

• We learn best when we make (and embrace) mistakes.

• Promoting psychologically safe environments that encourages sensible risk taking, and

• Learning from mistakes and failures (Fletcher & Sarkar, 2016).

• Recognition for the ‘best’ mistakes (the ones that show errors through thought rather than through careless error or oversight).

• This approach can ‘turn the tide of confidence’ in rehearsals studios | own home.

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Building a resilient mind-set

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The role of feedback

Building emotional literacy

and regulation

Involving others Reframing events

Help Identifying emotions

• Let’s try to notice when, where and why we are feeling upset.

• And – let’s act on the PLAN we have set ourselves rather than act on our mood.

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Explicitly Learning about Emotions

Focus on the dual process:

• Recognizing and Identifying Emotions

• Recognizing and regulating our own emotions

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Identifying choices for emotional regulation

• Developing the capacity to regulate emotions (self-regulation) is critical to a dancer’s development.

• The how’s need to be individualized in the current CV-19 situation.

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Building a resilient mind-set

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The role of feedback

Building emotional literacy

and regulation

Involving others Reframing events

Seeking and receiving help from others

• Encouraging dancers to rely on others, and trust that others can help and support them when needed.

• Ideally, we will have a range of sources of help, both within ourselves and externally.

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How can we help each others

• Small acts of kindness appear to strengthen the resilience and wellbeing of the person performing the act of kindness.

• Act of gratitude – through journaling or a weekly letter.

• Practicing self-compassion and self-care.

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Building a resilient mind-set

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The role of feedback

Building emotional literacy

and regulation

Involving others Reframing events

Reframe events

• It can be useful to try making sense of something from the past in a positive way.

• Alternative views can promote a more adaptive view.

• Reframing events often involves considering what others might think, or how information / evidence has been evaluated.

Maintain hope & a sense of perspective

• Hope helps to hold on to the possibility of change, and the anticipation that tomorrow will be different or better.

• Position your own experiences within a validated personal context / your own long-term perspective.

• Do not make comparisons – your own reality is as valid as someone’s else

• Avoid judging yourself

SYMPTOM REDUCTION AND ADAPTATION STRATEGIES

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Reframing

Thought-stopping - never finish the worry, always interrupt it.

STOP > RELAX > POSITIVE SELF-TALK

Implement the protective strategies such as: breathing, relaxation, routines, social support system, positive self-statements, constructive rest…

Resilience - Tools

Take Home Messages• Be kind to yourself.

• Your targets need to flexibly adjust to the reality of today.

• Practice your own personal resilience by setting yourself clear achievable, effortful process goals which are context relevant in the COVID-19 health crisis.

• Control the controllable.

• Accept what you cannot control.

• Practice self-compassion and self-care

• Practice gratitude and kindness

Selected References:

• Fletcher, D., & Sarkar, M. (2012). A grounded theory of psychological resilience in Olympic champions. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 13(5), 669–678. doi:10.1016/j.psychsport.2012.04.007

• Fletcher, D, & Sarkar, M. (2013). Psychological resilience: A review and critique of definitions, concepts, and theory. European Psychologist, 18(1), 12–23. doi:10.1027/1016-9040/a000124

• Fletcher, D., & Sarkar, M. (2016). Mental fortitude training: An evidence-based approach to developing psychological resilience for sustained success. Journal of Sport Psychology in Action, 7(3), 135–157. doi:10.1080/21520704.2016.1255496

• Hays, K.F. (Ed.) (2009). Performance Psychology in Action. American Psychological Association: Washington DC.

• Seligman, M. E. P., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2000). Positive psychology : An introduction. American Psychologist, 55, 5-14.

• Seligman, M. E. P. (2011) Flourish: A Visionary New Understanding of Happiness and Well-being, New York, Free Press.

• Nicholson McBride Resilience Questionnaire: https://www.nwpgmd.nhs.uk/sites/default/files/resiliencequestionnaire.pdfAccessed May, 2020

• Mindtools: https://www.mindtools.com/ Accessed May 2020.

Questions

• E: irina@roncaglia.co.uk

• W: https://www.roncaglia.co.uk

• @IrinaRoncaglia

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