How do professionals portray adolescents' resilience in residential care? A qualitative study

Abstract

Adolescents in residential care may achieve positive outcomes despite previous adverse experiences. However, literature focuses more on negative outcomes than resilience. Supportive relationships between professionals and adolescents in residential care are key to ensuring resilience in adolescents. Therefore, professionals' perspectives need to be explored. This study aimed to identify professionals' perspectives on resilience factors among adolescents in residential care. Fifteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with a sample of female professionals (aged 23–51 years old; M = 35.47, SD = 8.06) working in three Portuguese residential care facilities. Professionals outlined resilience as the ability to overcome difficult situations, highlighting the support provided in residential care (e.g., emotional and instrumental), together with personal assets and adaptive coping as protective factors. Also, collaborative approaches between services and significant figures (e.g., family, school and residential care) were reported. This study offers theoretically new insights about the resilience of adolescents in the childcare system, and practical implications are discussed.