Salvatore R. Maddi

The story of hardiness: Twenty years of theorizing, research, and practice.

DOI 10.1037//1061-4087.54.3.175 Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, Vol. 54, No. 3, 175–185 173 aware of the trend in research and practice concerning the debilitating effects of disruptive changes on which the magazine article was based. As I quickly discovered, this trend presented a challenge to my contention that creative people actively search for changes, f inding them more stimulating than debilitating. The disagreement between the two positions seemed to highlight an issue of individual differences to me: Although stressful changes may be debilitating for some people, perhaps they are developmentally provocative for others. My research team and I at the University of Chicago discussed this issue, and before long we decided to collect some relevant research data.

Personality and exercise as buffers in the stress-illness relationship

This study examined exercise and personality-based hardiness as independent buffers of the stressful event-illness relationship. Self-report measures of exercise, hardiness, stressful events and illness were obtained from 137 male business executives. Hardiness and exercise each interact with stressful events in decreasing illness. Further, subjects high in both hardiness and exercise remain more healthy than those high in one or the other only. These additive effects are consistent with the view that hardiness buffers by transforming the events themselves so as to decrease their stressfulness, whereas exercise buffers by decreasing the organismic strain resulting from experiencing stressful events.

Effectiveness of hardiness, exercise and social support as resources against illness

The effects of the resistance resources of personality hardiness, exercise, and social support, taken singly and in combination, on concurrent and prospective levels, and probability of illness were studied. In 1980, 85 male business executives identified as high in stressful events were tested for the three resistance resources. Predicting their illness scores in 1980 formed the concurrent aspect of the study. For the prospective aspect, illness scores in 1981 were available on 70 of the subjects. With regard to resistance resources, when there are none, one, two or three, the level and probability of both concurrent and prospective illness drop in a regular and marked fashion. These results highlight the importance of multiple resistance resources. Estimates of relative effectiveness indicate that hardiness is the most important of the resistance resources studied.

Hardiness: The courage to grow from stresses

The recent emphasis on positive psychology is welcome, and has spurred much relevant research. But, there are still many unresolved conceptual and research issues, as more variables are being proposed as relevant. As part of this process, the present paper proposes hardiness as an addition to positive psychology. Hardiness is a combination of attitudes that provides the courage and motivation to do the hard, strategic work of turning stressful circumstances from potential disasters into growth opportunities. In this regard, the inherently stressful nature of living is discussed. Also clarified are the particular aspects of excellence in performance and health to which hardiness is relevant. The paper concludes with a call for issue-resolving research through which orientations and actions proposed as part of positive psychology can be compared in their contributions to performance and health. Two studies along these lines have found hardiness more powerful than optimism and religiousness in coping with stresses.

An alienation test

imprecise nature (e.g., Kenniston, 1966; Srole, 1956) or overly narrow and limited (e.g., Neal & Rettig, 1967). Our research’ aimed to develop an alienation test that is conceptually comprehensive. A large pool of questionnaire items was constructed to sample four types and five contexts of alienation. The following types were chosen to represent major themes in relevant theorizing: powerlessness (Elmore, 1962; Neal & Rettig, 1967; Seeman, 1959), or despair of any influence over social or personal affairs; adventurousness (Kenniston, 1966; Maddi, 1967), or the inability to experience vitality unless one is engaged in extreme and dangerous activities; nihilism (Levin, 1960; McDill & Ridley, 1962; Maddi, 1967), or the insistent attempt to discredit anything that appears to have meaning; and vegetativeness (Elmore, 1962; Horney, 1950; Maddi, 1967), or the inability to believe in the truth, importance, or interest value of anything one is doing. The contexts in which these types of alienation can be expressed are the person’s relationship to work (Blauner, 1964; Marx, 1963), social institutions (Kenniston, 1966; Merton, 1957), family (Horney, 1950; Kenniston, 1966), other persons (Horney, 1950; Maddi, 1970), and self (Fromm, 1941; Maddi, 1970). Each questionnaire item was intended to tap one type and one context of alienation.

Hardiness: An Operationalization of Existential Courage

Existential psychologists emphasize the ongoing search for meaning in life that involves us in the ubiquitous decision-making process. Regardless of content, each decision involves choosing a future, unfamiliar path, or repeating a past, familiar path. Although choosing the future is most consistent with continuing to elaborate life’s meaning, it also brings ontological anxiety, as expressed in fear of uncertainty and possible failure. Consequently, existentialists believe that to choose the future regularly requires courage. Without courage, one may choose the past regularly, which stagnates the quest for meaning. Hardiness, comprised of the attitudes of commitment (vs. alienation), control (vs. powerlessness), and challenge (vs. security) is offered as an operationalization of existential courage. Hardiness has been shown in research to enhance performance and health, despite stressful changes, and to increase perceptions and actions consistent with choosing the future. Hardiness can now be assessed and trained to increase existential courage.

Type A and hardiness.

The study examined the relationship between the Type A behavior pattern and personality hardiness and predicted an interaction between the two that would be influential for illness onset. Type A and hardiness were found to be conceptually different and empirically independent factors. Under high stressful life events, male executives who were high in Type A and low in hardiness tended toward higher general illness scores than any other executives. Type A and hardiness emerge from this study as bases for extrinsic and intrinsic motivation, respectively.

The personality construct of hardiness: I. Effects on experiencing, coping, and strain.

Through research and practice over the past 20 years, hardiness has emerged as a personality disposition that enhances performance, conduct, morale, stamina, and health. This article furthers the construct validity of hardiness theorizing and assessment by determining the role of hardiness in moment

Relevance of Hardiness Assessment and Training to the Military Context

Hardiness is a pattern of attitudes and skills that provides the courage and strategies to turn stressful circumstances from potential disasters into growth opportunities instead. As such, hardiness is particularly relevant to inherently stressful settings, such as military service. First, theory and research on hardiness assessment and training is summarized in a manner than highlights relevance to stressful situations. Discussed then are likely applications of hardiness assessment and training in particular military contexts, such as selection and preparation for Special Forces or other extreme assignments, and treatment of combat-related physical and mental disabilities.

The Role of Hardiness and Grit in Predicting Performance and Retention of USMA Cadets

We examined the relative effectiveness of hardiness and grit as predictors of performance and retention among first year cadets at the USMA. Based on past research and theory, we expected that both hardiness and grit would predict unique variance in performance and retention even after controlling for past performance as measured by the Whole Candidate Score. Results of regression analyses revealed that hardiness and grit predicted unique variance in first year retention, but only hardiness predicted first year performance at USMA. These findings suggest that hardiness assessment and training may prove valuable in enhancing performance and retention within military training environments.