Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Resiliancy training for U.S. soldiers


Martin Seligman and other folks from the Positive Psychology Center are working with the U.S. Army to provide resiliency training for all active duty, reservist, and national guard soldiers - all 1.1 million of them! Their hope (and this hope is backed up by good outcome research) is that this training will help immunize soldiers against some of the depression and other mental health problems that result from the high-stress situations they will experience during their duties. A question for us as high school psychology teachers: if the research is convincing enough for the U.S. Army, should we folks in the schools consider resiliency training for students? Aren't these same cognitive skills (e.g. defusing negative attributions, identifying flawed thinking, etc.) essential for our students as they experience their significant stresses?

3 comments:

Mrs. Welle said...

How about resiliancy training for HS teachers? :)

Mrs. Welle said...

Another interesting post on mental health and the military (from Mind Hacks): http://www.mindhacks.com/blog/2009/08/standing_together_ag.html

Anonymous said...

What about mental health services for children of deployed soldiers?