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There are times in life, when too many risk factors with not enough protective factors prevent people from being able to be resilient. During these times, it may not be possible to be motivated, to overcome obstacles and move ahead. Risk factors increase suffering and weaken a person’s sense of safety, making it difficult for the person to gain the motivation to act or to have hope that things will be able to improve or get better.

At times like these, people need the opportunity to regain resilience. These opportunities can come from a person’s support network, support professionals, programs or institutions set up to help. In some cases, that could be through healing programs like therapy or treatment, in other cases, positive life experiences can build up and provide enough resilience to strengthen people to keep trying.

Theories of Risk and Resilience provide insight into understanding why or how some people are far from the outcomes that they would choose for themselves. It can also give us insight into the emerging understanding of privilege, and the complex ways that experiences can interact to increase positive or negative outcomes for all people as they are living their lives.

Risk factors are negative experiences that deplete us. Risk factors can be stressful, painful, dangerous. They can also be ongoing over time or happen every once and a while.  Models have been created to account for multiple types of risk across many levels of lived experience. These risk factors can occur at the biological, psychological, family, community, or cultural level and are associated with a higher likelihood of negative outcomes. Outcomes can be affected by factors such as age, personality traits, behaviours, disability status and the environment. At every level of a person’s life, from the family to the community, to society, there can be embedded risk or resilience factors. The amount that these factors can effect one’s life can be very high. The more risk factors there are, the greater the chance of negative outcomes. That is because when two risk factors are present, there is a very good chance that they will start to interact and create the effect of a whole new risk factor. 

Protective factors are positive experiences that nourish us. Protective factors can be pleasant, exciting or spiritual. They can also be ongoing over time or happen every once and a while. Protective factors are associated with a lower likelihood of negative outcomes or that reduce a risk factor’s impact. Protective factors may be seen as having positive countering effects.

Three ways Protective Factors can work

1. Prevention

Some factors can prevent a risk factor from occurring at all.

For example: Young children who participate in Head Start programs are significantly less likely to struggle with emerging early literacy and later reading problems or adult illiteracy.

2. Buffer

Some protective factors act to buffer the strong negative effect of certain risk factors. A buffer protective factor reduces the effect of risk factors.

For example:

Strong family bonds can buffer against the risk factors present in peer groups with negative behaviour.

3. Interrupt

Some protective factors interrupt the momentum and impact of risk factors that are already happening to an individual. When risk factors are present, the interrupter protective factor will break or lessen the size of the impact of these risk factors.

Protective Factors Are Also Cumulative

The great news is, like risk factors, protective factors also tend to have a cumulative effect on the development. The more of them there are, the more of them there are likely to be and the more of them there are, the stronger the effect they will have on protecting development.

There are many examples of risk and protective factors that have been discovered in the research. The following examples come from the real-life stories and experiences shared with us by the people from the communities as well as from a wide range of research articles. The goal is to present a wide array of risk factors that are known to exist, for contemplation surrounding the barriers that every person may face.

Risk factors and protective factors can be experienced first-hand by the individuals or second-hand as a family or close friend of the individual. For example, if an adult in the home loses their job, this will serve as a risk factor for everyone who lives in the house.