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from Part III - The Organized and Organizing Nature of Meaning
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 June 2025
“Competence” is defined as “doing well,” and “resilience” is defined as “doing well in the face of adversity.” Without a developmental approach, based in meaning, these terms are merely labels for what is observed, and the definitions are circular. How do you know some children are resilient? They are doing well in adverse circumstances. Why are they doing well? Because they are resilient. Research shows that competence and resilience are in fact developmental constructions, built up age by age. Children who do well in high stress families, or who rebound from a period of difficulty, do so because they have a history of earlier positive support and/or changes in current circumstances. They maintain or reclaim positive expectations based on experience. This work paved the way for studies showing that early experience is not erased by developmental change and that adaptation is a product of the entire, cumulated history of experience, as well as current circumstances.
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