Resilience—the capacity to adapt, recover, and grow through adversity—is particularly salient for students navigating intensive academic, professional, and personal demands in such settings. This study investigates the effectiveness of a theoretically grounded, structured reflective journaling intervention as an innovative resilience-training pedagogy for postgraduate students working with vulnerable older adults. A qualitatively driven mixed-methods design was employed with 50 postgraduate students enrolled in a 12‑week Resilience course. Quantitatively, students completed a validated pre–post Self-Compassion Scale to assess emotional regulation and self-compassion, conceptualised as a core mechanism underpinning resilience, with paired t‑tests indicating increased self-kindness and common humanity and reduced over-identification. Qualitatively, the intervention was framed by Kolb’s experiential learning theory and operationalised through iterative cycles of experience, reflection, conceptual insight, and behaviour change. Weekly journals, structured using Gibbs’ reflective cycle, required critical examination of challenging situations, associated emotional and cognitive responses, and emergent adaptive strategies. Weekly journals and final essays were analysed using Braun and Clarke’s reflexive thematic analysis, yielding themes of heightened self-awareness, reduced self-criticism, and more compassionate, reflective engagement with challenges, demonstrating the pedagogical originality and utility of structured reflective journaling as a resilience-training modality in postgraduate education.

Authors:
Sau Kuen Lo, Hong Kong Metropolitan University, Hong Kong
Mimi Tse, Hong Kong Metropolitan University, Hong Kong

About the Presenter(s)
Ms Sau Kuen Lo is currently the Senior Lecturer in Nursing and Health Sciences in the Hong Kong Metropolitan University in Hong Kong. Ms Lo has keen interest in promoting resilience among health care providers and delivering mindfulness based programmes for educators and health care providers.

See this presentation on the full schedule – Thursday Schedule

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