How resilience is strengthened by exposure to stressors: the systematic self-reflection model of resilience strengthening.

<bold>Background: </bold>Exposure to demands is normally considered to drain resources and threaten wellbeing. However, studies have indicated a resilience-strengthening role for stressors.<bold>Objectives: </bold>This paper introduces a unifying model, including five testable hypotheses regarding how resilience can be strengthened progressively via exposure to life-stressors.<bold>Methods: </bold>We review and synthesize relevant scholarship that underpins the Systematic Self-Reflection model of resilience-strengthening.<bold>Results: </bold>The model highlights the importance of a specific meta-cognitive skill (self-reflection on one's initial stressor response) as a mechanism for strengthening resilience. The Systematic Self-Reflection model uniquely proposes five self-reflective practices critical in the on-going adaptation of three resilient capacities: (1) coping resources, (2) usage of coping and emotional regulatory repertoire, and (3) resilient beliefs. The self-reflective process is proposed to strengthen a person's resilience by developing insight into their already-present capacities, the limitations of these capacities, and by stimulating the search for person-driven alternative approaches.<bold>Conclusion: </bold>This model extends the existing scholarship by proposing how the experience of stressors and adversity may have resilience-strengthening opportunities. The implication of this model is that engaging with stressors can have positive consequences for longer-term healthy emotional development if scaffolded in adaptive reflective practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]