Cissy's note: This review of Resilience was shared with me a few weeks ago and I've been thinking about it ever since. I'll be thinking about it more at the next Resilience screening I go to next month. It's written by Lynn Davey, Ph.D.
I recently had the chance to view the documentary, Resilience: The biology of stress and the science of hope, by Jamie Redford and Karen Pritzker. The film aims to explain research findings on how Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) can produce toxic stress that can have long term effects on health and well being.
It is understandable that early childhood experts and advocates (who have been working for years to get public policies to keep pace with developmental science) would be excited about this film. In fact, many of my clients have spoken to me about their plans to host screenings of this film in their communities. I’m telling them not to. Here’s why.
In short, my concern is that the film provides endless opportunity for implicit biases about race and poverty to be reinforced, and offers no specific, actionable policy-based solutions (of which there are many). I actually don’t fault the filmmakers for this – I attribute it to the widespread misuse of traditional storytelling techniques in communications about social problems. What are traditional storytelling techniques? Those that focus on characters, both victims and heroes, to the exclusion of contexts. In the case of Resilience, the victims of toxic stress are almost entirely poor children and families of color, and the heroes (with a few notable exceptions) are white teachers, principals, therapists and scientists.
To read entire review, go here.
Cissy's note: I wonder if the author has seen Paper Tigers before and what her views of that are? I think I'll ask. I know I reacted more emotionally (in a good way) to Paper Tigers because it shared personal stories showing the impact of ACEs as well as telling about ACEs science. But I've felt and feel that both movies are effective at helping us all learn and talk about ACEs. What do you think/feel and did you have similar or different reactions to a Resilience screening? What have you heard from others? What do you think/feel now?
O.k., I wrote to this author on Facebook . I don't know her but she has a public page. Anyhow, she responded and since she's not (yet) a member of ACEs Connection, I asked her if I could share her response. She said yes. Here it is:
"I have seen Paper Tigers - what it did that Resilience doesn't is focus on a solution story. And it showed public, community investment in that solution - not just the school principal, but health and mental health providers, etc. And it showed the impact of that investment in terms of measurable behavioral and achievement outcomes at the school."
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