Ego-resiliency's role in reducing the impact of violence exposure on world assumptions

The present study examined whether ego-resiliency moderated the impact of violence exposure on psychological distress and world assumptions in a sample of 152 undergraduate students. Results were consistent with past findings that ego-resiliency correlated with and was a significant predictor of psychological distress. Individuals with higher levels of ego-resiliency tended to have lower symptoms ratings than individuals with lower levels of ego-resiliency. In addition, as expected, as violence exposure increased so did psychological distress. Further, benevolence of the world and self-worth significantly correlated with psychological health. While these findings have been reported in the trauma literature, there is a significant gap in the literature regarding how the relationship between ego-resiliency and violence exposure impacts the manner in which individuals function in and view the world. This study empirically examined the role of ego-resiliency as a protective personality characteristic and found a clear trend suggesting ego-resiliency reduces the negative impact of violence exposure on an individual's mental health. This study also examined the high violence exposure group to investigate the ego-resiliency process and found that individuals with high ego-resiliency who experience significant cumulative violence tend to possess more moderate world assumptions, while individuals low in ego-resiliency who experience similar violence tend to have either overly positive or overly negative word assumptions.