Stressing the relevance of resilience: a systematic review of resilience across the domains of sport and work

Resilience research is plagued with conceptual inconsistencies, particularly when considered across different contexts, not least because of the diversity of adverse situations across these contexts. We conducted a systematic review to examine current conceptualisations of resilience across the contexts of work and competitive sports. Utilising a sample of 52 articles comprising both qualitative and quantitative studies, we comprehensively reviewed research on psychological resilience across these two parallel achievement contexts. Results suggested that a state-like conceptualisation of resilience involving processes of adaptation and growth from stressors appears most amenable to advance research going forward. Correspondingly, there was comprehensive evidence that fluctuations in specific psychological resources may influence resilience capacities to deal with stress. Thus, there may be reciprocal relationships between resilience and a number of psychological resources buffering a broad spectrum of events varying from minor short-term, to moderate, to long-term adversities. Going forward, there is a need for more longitudinal studies to examine the dynamics of state-like conceptualisations of resilience and further examine such reciprocal relationships with various psychological resources.