Resilience Scale for Adults (RSA-33)

Description

The Resilience Scale for Adults (RSA-33) is a standardized psychometric instrument designed to assess psychological resilience and the protective resources that enable adults to adapt effectively to stress, adversity, and challenging life circumstances. Rather than conceptualizing resilience solely as an individual personality characteristic, the RSA adopts a multidimensional perspective that incorporates personal, interpersonal, family, and social resources contributing to successful psychological adaptation.

The RSA consists of 33 items organized into six protective factors: Personal Competence (6 items), Structured Style (7 items), Social Competence (6 items), Family Cohesion (6 items), Social Support (4 items), and Personal Perception of the Future (4 items). Together, these dimensions provide a comprehensive profile of the resources individuals can mobilize when confronted with stressful or adverse experiences.

Personal Competence reflects confidence in one’s abilities, personal strengths, and capacity to manage difficult circumstances. Structured Style concerns organization, planning, routines, and the ability to establish structure in everyday life. Social Competence represents interpersonal skills and the capacity to establish effective relationships with others. Family Cohesion assesses perceived support, stability, and connectedness within the family environment, while Social Support evaluates the availability of supportive interpersonal relationships outside the immediate family. Personal Perception of the Future reflects positive expectations, goal orientation, and confidence regarding future possibilities.

This multidimensional structure makes the RSA-33 particularly valuable because psychological resilience is understood not simply as resistance to adversity but as the availability of protective resources and adaptive mechanisms that may buffer the negative consequences of stressful experiences.

Data Analysis and Use

Data obtained from the RSA-33 can be analyzed both at the level of overall psychological resilience and across its individual protective dimensions. Descriptive statistics such as means, standard deviations, score distributions, and confidence intervals can initially be calculated for the total scale and individual subscales.

Factor analysis can be employed to investigate whether the expected multidimensional structure of the RSA is replicated within a particular population. Depending on the research design and existing evidence, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) or confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) may be used to examine the structural validity of the instrument.

Correlational analyses can investigate relationships between resilience and psychological characteristics such as anxiety, depression, psychological well-being, and other indicators of adaptation. Comparative statistical procedures, including independent-samples t-tests and analysis of variance (ANOVA), can be applied to investigate differences in resilience according to demographic, clinical, educational, occupational, or psychosocial characteristics.

Depending on the research objectives, RSA scores may also be incorporated into regression models and other multivariable analyses to investigate whether protective resources predict psychological adjustment or moderate the relationship between stressful experiences and mental health outcomes.

The RSA has been applied extensively in psychological resilience and adaptation research and in clinical contexts involving individuals who have experienced significant adversity. Its multidimensional structure enables researchers and practitioners not only to determine overall resilience but also to identify the specific personal and social resources that may contribute to successful adaptation.

Objective

The primary objective of the Resilience Scale for Adults (RSA-33) is to measure psychological resilience in adults through the assessment of protective factors and coping resources that can reduce or buffer the negative consequences of difficult experiences and stressful conditions.

The instrument therefore provides a broader assessment than measures focusing exclusively on symptoms or psychological difficulties. By identifying both personal strengths and interpersonal resources, the RSA-33 can contribute to understanding why some individuals maintain or regain psychological functioning despite exposure to adversity.

The questionnaire can be particularly useful in psychological, clinical, health-related, occupational, and social research examining resilience, adaptation, mental health, coping, well-being, and responses to adversity.

Scoring

Each of the 33 items of the RSA is rated using a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 = Strongly Disagree to 5 = Strongly Agree. Responses are combined according to the scoring procedure to obtain an overall resilience score and to examine the individual protective dimensions represented by the questionnaire.

According to the scoring system described in the source material, the total RSA-33 score ranges from 33 to 165 points. Higher scores indicate a greater presence of protective resources and higher psychological resilience, whereas lower scores indicate fewer protective resources and comparatively lower resilience.

Subscale scores can also be examined separately for Personal Competence, Structured Style, Social Competence, Family Cohesion, Social Support, and Personal Perception of the Future. This approach provides a more detailed resilience profile and can help identify specific areas of psychological or social strength as well as dimensions in which protective resources may be comparatively limited.

Validity

The conceptual validity of the RSA-33 has been supported through repeated studies involving diverse populations, including clinical populations, university students, and individuals from the general population. The scale demonstrates consistent positive associations with indicators of mental health and psychological well-being, providing evidence supporting its convergent and discriminant validity.

The multidimensional nature of the instrument also permits investigation of its structural validity through factor analytic procedures, enabling researchers to determine whether the proposed protective-factor structure is reproduced within the population under examination.

Reliability

The RSA-33 demonstrates satisfactory to excellent psychometric reliability. Reported Cronbach’s alpha coefficients for the total scale range from 0.74 to 0.92, indicating adequate to high internal consistency across different applications and populations.

Evidence of temporal stability is also satisfactory. Test–retest reliability over a four-month period ranges from r = 0.69 to r = 0.84. The individual subscales have similarly demonstrated satisfactory internal consistency and stability over time, supporting the use of the RSA for both cross-sectional and longitudinal research.

References

Friborg, O., Hjemdal, O., Rosenvinge, J. H., & Martinussen, M. (2003). A New Rating Scale for Adult Resilience: What Are the Central Protective Resources Behind Healthy Adjustment? International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research, 12(2), 65–76.

Friborg, O., Martinussen, M., & Rosenvinge, J. H. (2006). Likert-Based vs. Semantic Differential-Based Scorings of Positive Psychological Constructs. Personality and Individual Differences, 40(5), 873–884.

Hjemdal, O. (2007). Measuring Protective Factors: The Development of Two Resilience Scales in Norway. Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Clinics of North America, 16, 303–321.

Hjemdal, O., Friborg, O., Stiles, T. C., Rosenvinge, J. H., & Martinussen, M. (2006). Resilience Predicting Psychiatric Symptoms: A Prospective Study. Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, 13, 194–201.