The brief thriving scale: Assessing the ability to learn, grow, and find benefits in stressful events

Abstract

While much research has focused on the ability to recover from the negative effects of stress, little has examined our potential for benefitting from stressful events. The current studies validated the Brief Thriving Scale (BTS), which assesses the ability to learn, grow, and benefit from stress. Participants were 855 undergraduate who completed the BTS, a battery of health-related measures, and the Brief Resilience Scale (BRS; Smith et al., 2008), which assesses resilience as the ability to bounce back from stress. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses demonstrated the construct validity of the BTS and correlation analyses supported convergent and divergent validity. Multiple regression analyses showed that the BTS was consistently related to better health when controlling for the BRS. While the BRS was a stronger predictor of negative mental health (e.g., lower negative emotion, depression), the BTS was a stronger predictor of positive mental health (e.g., higher positive emotion, meaning) and general physical health.