Child Psychology
Book: Berk, L. E., & Myers, A. B. (2021). Infants and children: Prenatal through middle childhood (9th ed.).
Boston, MA: Pearson/Allyn and Bacon.
Identify an adult you know well (e.g., a family member or close family friend) who experienced and overcame significant adversity as a child or adolescent (e.g., death of a parent or sibling, community or school violence, had a mentally ill parent, became a teenage parent, experienced poverty, was removed from the family home).
If the adult is comfortable discussing the situation, conduct an interview with him or her.
Remember to protect the identity of the individual and maintain confidentiality when writing your paper.
(a) Ask the individual to briefly describe the childhood/adolescent experience.
(b) How did he/she respond to the event?
(c) What factors helped him/her to overcome the event?
Following the interview, compare the answers with research from the text. What factors likely contributed to the individual’s resilience (e.g., personal characteristics, warm parental relationship, social support outside the family, community resources). Use examples from the interview. Cite the text when appropriate.
