Citation

Eshel Y, Kimhi S, Marciano H. J. Community Psychol. 2019; 47(8): 1952-1960.

Affiliation

Department of Psychology, Telhai College, Upper Galilee, Israel.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1002/jcop.22245

PMID

31508830

Abstract

Community resilience (CR) is a positive trajectory of adaptation of a commune after a disturbance, stress, or adversity. Previous studies have successfully predicted CR in times of stress by distal factors, such as demographic characteristics of the community members and by their psychological attributes. We submit that since all these variables are distal predictors, which are not directly related to the actual stressful condition, CR would be predicted more readily by proximal factors, which portray people's responses to the investigated adversity (i.e., trust in the community emergency team). A sample of 1,515 adults, living in terror-stricken border communities in northern Israel has been examined. Their perceived CR has been predicted concurrently by distal and by proximal factors.

RESULTS have supported the research hypotheses, indicating the importance of proximal variables in determining and promoting CR.

© 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Language: en

Keywords

community resilience; proximal and distal predictors; threat of terror