Resiliency factors of the North American indigenous people

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to identify resiliency promoting attitudes and behaviors used by urban and reserve North American Indian parents. The focus for resiliency attitudes was identification at the individual, familial, and culture specific levels. The focus for the resiliency behaviors was identification at the individual, familial, culture specific and marital levels. Also a level of difference was examined for the urban and reserve respondents. The subjects were North American Indian parents who resided on a reserve or urban setting. Most of the urban surveys were filled out by people who live or work in the St.Paul/Minneapolis metro area. The cultural affiliation of the urban respondents included people from the Great Plains Indian Nations, the Great Lakes Indian Nations, and the Southwest Indian Nations. The reserve respondents were from the Six Nations Reserve in Ontario, Canada. All but two reserve participants identified themselves as Mohawk, Longhouse/Cayuga, or Onkwehonwe and the remaining two identified their affiliation as Blackfeet/ Ojibway and Ojibway. The survey instrument consisted of three sections: Demographics, resiliency attitudes statements, and resiliency behaviors statements. The 34 resiliency attitude statements and the 30 resiliency behavior statements were designed by the researcher using information collected through the literature review. The majority of the surveys were distributed at sites, in the Minneapolis /St. Paul metro area, and mailed to Ontario Canada. A University of Wisconsin-Stout research and statistical consultant analyzed the completed surveys. The frequency, mean and standard deviation were calculated for each item in section II-attitudes and section III-behaviors. Mean subscale scores were also calculated for section II and section III. The reliability of the attitude and behavior subscales were calculated using Cronbach’s Alpha reliability coefficient. A correlate was run for each subscale in section II with each subscale in section III on total subscale scores. T-Tests were run on all items in section II and section III plus the subscales for urban and reserve. The research results regarding resiliency attitude revealed that the respondents agreed with more family resiliency attitudes than individual attitudes. Out of the 15 top ranked attitude statements eight were from the family subscale, five were culture specific attitudes and only three of the top 15 ranked items were individual resiliency attitudes. According to the research on multi-cultural “Tribal” based cultures, “family” is of most importance. The high ranking and high frequency of family resiliency attitude statements confirms the cultural attitude of family interdependence. There were 7 culture specific items listed in the top 18 resiliency attitude statements. The most agreed with culture specific statement was ranked second: “I am thankful for what I have”. The research results regarding resiliency behaviors revealed that the respondents agreed with more family resiliency behavior statements and cultural specific statements than individual behavior statements. The results of this study found little difference between the urban and reserve respondents. Of the 34 resiliency attitude statements and the 30 resiliency behavior statements there were only eight items which revealed a significant difference.