Relationships among Trait Resilience, Virtues, Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, and Post-traumatic Growth.

Wenjie Duan,Pei Gan,Pengfei Guo,Alexandra Kavushansky

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0125707

Abstract

The present study aims to examine the relationship between trait resilience and virtues in the context of trauma. A total of 537 participants who attended the preliminary investigation and completed the Life Events Checklist were screened. Of these participants, 142 suffered from personal traumatic experiences in the past year; these individuals were qualified and invited to respond to online questionnaires to assess trait resilience, virtues (i.e., Conscientiousness, Vitality, and Relationship), post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms, and post-traumatic growth (PTG). The following questionnaires were used: Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale-Revised, Chinese Virtues Questionnaire, PTSD Checklist-Specific, and Post-traumatic Growth Inventory-Chinese. Only 95 participants who manifested self-reported PTSD symptoms and PTG were involved in the current analyses. Trauma was positively and significantly correlated with PTSD in the current sample. Results indicated that trait resilience was positively associated with virtues and PTG; by contrast, PTSD scores were negatively but not significantly related to most of these factors. The three virtues contributed to PTG to a greater extent than trait resilience in non-PTSD and PTSD groups. However, trait resilience remained a significant predictor in the PTSD group even when the three virtues were controlled. The relationship between trait resilience and PTG was moderated by PTSD type (non-PTSD group vs. PTSD group). Our results further suggested that trait resilience and virtues were conceptually related but functionally different constructs. Trait resilience and virtues are positively related; thus, these factors contributed variances to PTG in the context of trauma; however, trait resilience is only manifested when virtues are controlled and when individuals are diagnosed as PTSD. Furthermore, implications and limitations of this study are discussed.

Highlights

Life-threatening events, such as earthquake, bereavement, and cancer, cause post-traumatic stress disorders (PTSD) and post-traumatic growth (PTG); PTG is indicated as positive changes and transcendences from traumatic experiences [1, 2]
The present study aims to explore the relationship between trait resilience and three virtues based on a sample with personal trauma in one year and on self-reported PTSD and PTG
These findings indicated that virtues and trait resilience were conceptually related but functionally different constructs

Summary

Introduction

Life-threatening events, such as earthquake, bereavement, and cancer, cause post-traumatic stress disorders (PTSD) and post-traumatic growth (PTG); PTG is indicated as positive changes and transcendences from traumatic experiences [1, 2]. Previous studies demonstrated that virtues [4] and trait resilience [5] are positively related to PTG. These studies have not examined the relationship between trait resilience and virtues in the same traumatic context. In contrast to a theoretically proposed six-factor structure, a five-factor virtue structure, including interpersonal, fortitude, cognitive, transcendence, and temperance, based on data pool is established by principal component factor analysis. These five virtues are significantly and positively related to PTG [4]

Methods

Results

Conclusion