Recovering from a (research) disaster using resilience

How does a student recover from a catastrophic event that has derailed their studies? Students expect a doctoral journey to be long and difficult, but what happens if a major catastrophe occurs: someone else publishes an identical project, making the student’s research obsolete; their computer crashes and with it, the only copy of their research results; a significant person in their life suffers an accident or passes away? This chapter considers how, from childhood adversity (Comas-Diaz et al. The road to resilience. American Psychological Association (APA), brochure. http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/road-resilience.aspx, 2017) to ‘antifragility’ (Taleb, N. N. 2012. Antifragile: Things That Gain From Disorder. New York: Random House), it is important to consider how the environment shapes our ability to cope with misfortune. All experiences of research journeys are different; where some survive—or even thrive—when contending with challenges, others cannot continue. This chapter argues that all students benefit from learning the steps resilient people take when recovering from a disaster, and—in providing a study of resilience generally, and a case study of the student-author’s experience—how all students can apply these steps to their own challenges.