Building Resilience in Adult Online Students

Student resilience has been shown to increase persistence in online academic programs. Resilience is a skill that can be developed (Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004). One method, the broaden-and-build theory, focuses on building positive thought repertoires in students to help them combat negative thought repertoires that can lead to downward spirals of negative emotions (Jackson, Firtko, & Edenborough, 2007). Thought repertoires are the connections our brain makes between events, actions, and emotions (Garland, Frederickson, Kring, Johnson, Meyer, & Penn, 2010). Creating more positive emotional connections between the student and the program in the online classroom can build positive thought repertoires, which can be used during times of adversity to combat stress (Fredrickson, 1998, 2001; Fredrickson & Branigan, 2005). SUPPORTING THE SUCCESS OF ADULT AND ONLINE STUDENTS 272 273 experience stress and anxiety (Hartley, 2011). Klibert et al. (2014) have also shown that stress can be a result of perfectionism known to be partially mediated by increased resilience. Increasing the feeling of connectedness, and increasing students’ resiliency in the process, benefits students by decreasing stress and promoting persistence, which will help them achieve their personal educational goals (Hart, 2012). Increasing resiliency has been studied for some time in the psychological community. Fredrickson (1998, 2001) developed the leading theory on building resiliency over seventeen years ago. The broadenand-build theory was created after research showed a strong connection between positive emotions and resiliency. Fredrickson (1998, 2001) posited that positive emotions broaden thought-action repertoires, helping people to be more resilient by building personal resources. Thought-action repertoires are the scripts that lead thoughts to become emotions or actions: “joy sparks the urge to play, interest sparks the urge to explore, contentment sparks the urge to savor and integrate” (Fredrickson, 2001, p. 1). Negative emotions can also trigger responses; however, those responses are more often narrow such as attacking or fleeing (Fredrickson, 2004). The broaden-and-build theory predicts that focusing on positive emotions builds psychological resilience by broadening thinking and building more thought repertoires that help people cope (Fredrickson, 2004). Broadening resilience has also been shown to increase the ability of students to pay attention to the subject they are learning by limiting distracting emotions (Fredrickson & Branigan, 2005). Resilience then is seen as a key for helping students control their emotions. Garland et al. (2010) asserted that emotions are systems that maintain a set organization. For example, fear of failing becomes connected to anger, and then when a grade is not what was expected, that anger can lead to an outburst. Students can feel bad about what they have done and then they can spiral downward into self-hatred and other negative thoughts or behaviors, reinforcing the negative experience. By broadening someone’s positive scripts and creating more upward positive spirals, the student is better able to recover from negative events and therefore becomes more resilient. Pulling from the existing literature on the broaden-and-build theory, the next section will apply broadening principles to online classroom experiences that can help build resilience in students. Overview Resilience is the ability to adjust to adversity using positivity and a flexible set of attitudes (Jackson et al., 2007; Klibert, Lamis, Collins, Smalley, Warren, Yancey, & Winterowd, 2014). Tugade and Fredrickson (2004) in a study of college students found that having a positive mindset allowed for positive emotions that in turn aided students in recovering from adverse events. Putting a positive spin on negative events is an important skill that helps students become more resilient. Another study suggests that resilience can be created when faculty build relationships with students especially when they give the students opportunities to become more reflective during their program (Jackson et al., 2007). Much of the current research into the student experience in higher education does not consider the importance of resilience, motivation, and the student’s life experiences in helping students avoid stress (Brewer, 2010). Moreover, a more recent study by Klibert et al. (2014) indicated student depression and anxiety are often linked to socially prescribed perfectionism, which was shown in their study to be mediated by resilience. Finding ways to increase resilience in students, especially in an online environment, can help students combat the increased anxiety often associated with online learning. This chapter explores the literature on resiliency to identify best practices that can be specifically implemented in an online environment to help develop student resilience and maintain high rates of student persistence. Review of the Literature Resilience is a relatively new concept in the research related to student learning and the concept of adaptability under stress (Hartley, 2011). Resilience in this context is defined as the ability to handle adversity and adjust to it in a positive manner (Jackson et al., 2007). Adversity in distance learning can result from issues with technology, the lack of direct interaction with the faculty, and feelings of loneliness (Park & Choi, 2009). Adversity can also lead to stress, which is known to affect academic performance and, ultimately, persistence (Hartley, 2011). Additionally, students who experience disconnection from a program are more likely to SUPPORTING THE SUCCESS OF ADULT AND ONLINE STUDENTS 274 275 receiving criticism such as in a grading situation. Adding humorous videos or comics along with the lesson can also set a positive mood in the online space. Making a connection with the student builds the relationship; the more positive the student relationship with the professor, the more resilience can be generated. In addition to creating videos for the classroom at large, faculty can create personal grade feedback for students, particularly when they have many issues to address in a paper. Recording grade feedback either with video or with audio-only files has been shown to create a greater connection between the student and the faculty member, allowing for more complex ideas to be exchanged (Marriott & Teoh, 2012; Wolff-Hilliard & Baethe, 2014). In a study of over one hundred students, Marriot and Teoh (2012) found that students who received video and audio feedback for writing assignments felt that the feedback was more personal than written feedback. They also overwhelming felt that the feedback was clear and easy to understand. The connection that audio or visual feedback gives the student during what is typically a negative experience can create a more positive response in students (Marriott & Teoh, 2012). Critically thinking about ways in which you can build students up and change the script from a negative interaction to a positive interaction begins to change the scripts in students’ minds, therefore broadening their thought repertoires and increasing resiliency. Another method to increase positivity in the classroom is through reflective or stress-relieving fun assignments. Creating an assignment designed to make the learning more fun using multimedia, alternative assignment formats, or time to play with the learning allows students to begin associating learning with play, which can elicit joy and happiness (Garland et al., 2010). The sense of play can create new thought repertoires when connected to the online environment. Using the same week for this playful exercise in every class gives students something to look forward to in each class. Over time these moments build a student’s resilience by creating happy thought repertoires. For variety, a sense of surprise can be added by hiding the assignment until the week before, which gives the students something to look forward to. Fava and Tomba (2009) asserted that the distance from a goal can often increase a student’s negative thoughts and stress. Therefore, another method to build resilience in students is to create short-term goals that allow them to accomplish nongraded tasks that can be acknowledged. For example, the first student to Broadening Student Resilience Many psychological studies have shown that resilience can be built and influenced by others (Abbott, Klein, Hamilton, & Rosenthal, 2009; Fava & Tomba, 2009; Fredrickson 1998, 2001, 2004; Fredrickson & Branigan, 2005; Garland et al., 2010; Luthans, Vogelgesang, & Lester, 2006; Stallman, 2011; Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004; Vacharkulksemsuk & Fredrickson, 2013). Broadening students’ resilience by building up positive thought repertoires can help students recover from stressful and adverse life events, getting them back on track faster (Fredrickson 1998, 2001). In the online academic setting, there are limited opportunities for face-to-face connections with students. Therefore, it is important to be mindful of opportunities where negative thoughts can lead to downward spirals (e.g., low grades on papers, large assignments due, past due work, sickness, negative life events, and boundaries, such as final exams and projects or the end of the quarter). These opportunities present a chance to build positive thought repertoires by changing the dialogue from a negative story to a positive one. It is possible to build positive thought repertoires by creating new stories around studying, reading, completing assignments, discussion boards, and faculty feedback on assignments. For instance, associating a sense of accomplishment or prestige to reading an entire book in one week creates pride that can lead to a greater sense of self-worth. If this happens enough times, it becomes part of the student’s thought repertoire associated with required readings. This positive association will co