Brianne Rivera
UNIV-150
Professor Inajane
6 November 2018
Grit vs. Resilience: Which Is Better?
Introduction
When someone says the words “Grit and Resilience,” people often believe the two words to mean the same exact thing, however, that’s not entirely true. According to the article, "Persevering with Positivity and Purpose: An Examination of Purpose Commitment and Positive Affect as Predictors of Grit.", Patrick L. Hill, a psychologist at Washington University, defines grit as a passion and perseverance for one’s goals, has been consistently demonstrated as an adaptive resource across multiple domains (Hill et al, 257). In simpler terms, grit is the passion to achieve one's goals no matter how hard it may be to get there. In the article, “Life Satisfaction Among College Students: A Study Exploring the Role of Resilience”, Sudha Rathore, a Doctor of Psychology working at the IIS University, defines resilience as the capacity to cope with and adjust to change in the face of adversity. In simplicity, resilience is being able to adjust to change an cope with emotions such as stress. Although having grit gives you the ability to strive for the goals that you want to accomplish, I believe that the ability to cope with stressful situations, otherwise known as resilience, will be able to help you a lot more in the long run.
Opposing View – Grit
Patrick L. Hill and other writers in the article "Persevering with Positivity and Purpose: An Examination of Purpose Commitment and Positive Affect as Predictors of Grit.", claim to believe that even when faced with hardships, students who continue to strive for greatness and are passionate towards their goals are the students who are going to be more successful in not only their life but their academic settings (Hill et al, 257-258). Gritty students tend to aim higher in life, they want to do their absolute best in order to be their absolute best.
The psychologists Patrick L. Hill, Anthony L. Burrow, and Kendall Cotton Bronk all wanted to test the grittiness in college students. They first set off to Canada to complete the Purpose Commitment experiment. The hypothesis for this experiment was "Compared to students who lack a sense of direction in life, those who have committed to a purpose or direction should report higher levels of grit, in order to help them strive towards their life goals." (Hill, Burrow, Bronk 258) The survey they gave this group of college students was a survey with questions based on purpose, identity, and personality. The second experiment conducted was set in a small American university and this experiment was called the Positive Emotions experiment with the hypothesis, "Having a strong base of positive emotionality should better equip individuals to develop abilities and skills that promote later success, such as grit." (Hill, Burrow, Bronk 258) Based on the two experiments grittier individuals have shown higher levels of both purpose commitment and positive effect.
In the article, "Grit is Not Enough" by Robert Bonfiglio, a vice president for Campus and Student Life at SUNY Geneseo, explains why he believes that extreme cases of grit are not good for the world. He claims that in extreme cases of grit, winners and losers are created (Bonfiglio 2017). Some believe that this creation can cause a divide in the student body. Winners can become overconfident and this can make said "losers" to become unsure of themselves. Bonfiglio even goes on to say that the effects of being a winner can become draining for them (Bonfiglio 2017). This might be because they're always striving to be the best and sometimes people just need rest.
Vicki Zakrzewski, the education director at the Greater Good Science Center, explores the reasons why grading a child by their level of grittiness isn’t the best thing to do (Zakrzewski 2014). Zakrzewski first claims that teachers really don't know how to teach grit. Developmentalists have researched grit and they have found that since grit is known to be a more stable characteristic trait, there is no way to really tell the level of grit someone has because someone's personality traits can change from the time they're a child to when they're an adult (Zakrzewski 2014). Secondly, she claims that grit requires a passion for a long-term goal. Students often have a hard time to create and stick to a life-long goal. The student may not be encouraged to complete that goal when they grow up, there are so many possibilities as to why this would not work out (Zakrzewski 2014). Lastly, Vicki goes on to talk about how grit can play a dark role in your life. When you have grit, there's a possibility that when faced with hardships in your life, you'll push those hardships away without dealing with it, this can cause someone's life to become harder in the future (Zakrzewski 2014).
My View – Resilience
Everyone in life goes through hard times, there’s no way to really get past that type of stuff. When you have resilience, you’re able to cope better in those type of situations, and according to Sudha Rathore, a Doctor of Psychology working at the IIS University, who wrote the article “Life satisfaction among college students: A study exploring the role of resilience”, optimism plays a huge role in accompanying resilience. Rathore states that even if a task is taking a long time to complete, someone with optimism is more likely to show resilience in those situations (Rathore 237). Research done by Rathore has proven that when you have a good and positive experience in school, you are more likely to have a positive outlook on life. This shows that teachers should not only focus on the teaching aspect of being a teacher, but also the psychological factors in student satisfaction (Rathore 238).
According to Winnie Mak, a teacher at the Department of Psychology at the University of Hong Kong describes resilient people as confident, determined, and more energetic in life. Resilient people seem to have a higher self-esteem because resilient people believe that they deserve better in life. Since he saw those characteristics of resilient people, he hypothesized that resilient people have a more positive outlook on the world, their well-being, and the future. It turns out he was just right. His studies given to Chinese undergrads proved that outlook on life, hope, the future and the well-being of people were all positively correlated to resilience (Mak 2011)
Common Ground – Importance of Both
Both Grit and Resilience are really important to teach students nowadays, no matter if one thinks that one is better than the other. Grit gives students the opportunity to strive for great things such as good grades, a future in the field they want to work in and any life-long dream that they want to accomplish. Resilience allows students to cope with things such as stress when they’re overwhelmed in college and any possible hardship that may occur in their family. Both offer something really good for a student in college.
Resolution – What Should We Be Teaching Kids Now?
Grit and resilience are both great characteristics that children should be able to learn in the classroom. We should be able to show the kids the proper way to not only set life-long goals but also show them that there is a way to deal with whatever bad emotion they're going through. However, children shouldn't be limited to those two characteristics only. Children should be able to learn and develop characteristics that will better the community we live in. We should also teach students on how to grow themselves into a better person who they will grow to love in the future.
Conclusion
Grit and Resilience are both great characteristics to have. Grit is the ability to strive for greatness no matter what hardship occurs in your life. Resilience is the ability to cope with change. Even though being able to strive for life-long goals can help you out with some things, Resilience, the ability to cope with higher degrees of stress will help you out a lot more in the long run. Works Cited
Bonfiglio, Robert A. “Grit Is Not Enough.” About Campus, vol. 22, no. 5, Nov. 2017, pp.
29–31. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1002/abc.21304.
Hill, Patrick, et al "Persevering with Positivity and Purpose: An Examination of Purpose
Commitment and Positive Affect as Predictors of Grit." Journal of Happiness Studies,
vol. 17, no. 1, Feb. 2016, pp. 257-269. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1007/s10902-014-9593-5.
Mak, Winnie W. S., et al. “Resilience: Enhancing Well-Being through the Positive Cognitive
Triad.” Journal of Counseling Psychology, vol. 58, no. 4, Oct. 2011, pp. 610–617.
EBSCOhost, doi:10.1037/a0025195.
Rathore, Sudha. "Life Satisfaction among College Students: A Study Exploring the Role of
Resilience." Indian Journal of Positive Psychology, vol. 8, no. 2, Apr. 2017, pp.
237-239.EBSCOhost, summit.csuci.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login
.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=125142858&site=ehost-live.
Zakrzewski, Vicki. "What's Wrong with Grit?." Greater Good Magazine, Greater Good Science
Center at UC Berkeley, 20 Mar. 2014. Accessed 12 Oct. 2018.