HSCI 8611NEF
HSCI 8611NEF |
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Building Resilience in the Smart Era |
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Course Coordinator:
Dr Tung Ling Ngai Fabian, PhD EdUHK, MSN PolyU, BSN PolyU, PRCC(Advanced Medical Nursing) IANS
Introduction
HSCI 8611NEF Building Resilience in the Smart Era is a one-term, three-credit-unit, postgraduate level course offered to first year students of the Master of Science in Smart Ageing and Gerontology programme.
This course aims to cultivate resilience with embodiments of experiencing essential elements of compassion among students and integrating these key elements in fostering the well-being of older adults. Attitudes towards ageing are found to be associated with a range of beliefs in health and well-being in older age. The resilience model of ageing tailored to an individual's unique strengths and circumstances enable older adults to maintain high and stable functional ability and intrinsic capacity over their life time for as long as possible. Savouring happiness and the positive experiences may have the potential to build resilience among older adults.
Compassion may be a modifiable internal resource to promote healthy attitudes to ageing. Cultivating self-compassion among older adults may strengthen emotional resilience, offering new and healthy ways to cope with life adversities of ageing, leading to the preservation of their well-being, as well as more satisfied and fulfilling lives. Gerontechnology has now become one of the possibilities. It has impacted the world apart by alleviating healthcare financing in the public arena and enhancing quality of life of the older adults. It also brings valuable teaching tools into the health programmes to train students' preparedness as care providers.
To help students cope with compassion fatigue and develop resilience, simulated nursing scenarios through high-tech high-touch will bring these experiences to the classroom prior to their real-life encounters in hospitals and old-aged residential care homes, in order to get them more psychologically prepared.
Aims
This course aims to:
Learning outcomes
Upon successful completion of the course, students should be able to:
Course contents
Topic 1: The evolving definitions and determinants of resilience
Topic 2: Understanding resilience from a system models perspective
Topic 3: Resilience and ageing
Topic 4: Emotional resilience and self-compassion
Topic 5: Triangle of awareness
Topic 6: Awakening our hearts
Topic 7: Discovering compassionate resonance
Topic 8: Living deeply
Topic 9: Life adversity and adaptation
Topic 10: Meeting with life challenges
Topic 11: Reappraisal, reintegration and embracing life
Assessment
Course assessment consists of the following components. The proportion of each aspect towards the overall course score is indicated as follows:
Individual reflective essay
Each student is required to write a reflective essay of 2,500 to 3,000 words upon completion of the course. It constitutes 50% of the overall course score.
Group project presentation and report
The group project presentation will be arranged at the end of the term.
Students will be divided into groups of four at the beginning of the course. Each group is required to give a 20-to-25-minute presentation on the chosen topic in a seminar session.
The group project presentation and report account for 50% of the overall course score.
Required/Essential readings
Allen, A., Goldwasser, E., & Leary, M. (2012). Self-compassion and well-being among older adults. Self and Identity, 11(4), 428–453. https://doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2011.595082
Bailey, W., & Harrist, A. (2018). Family caregiving: Fostering resilience across the life course. Springer.
Brown, L., Bryant, C., Brown, V., Bei, B., & Judd, F. (2016). Self-compassion, attitudes to ageing and indicators of health and well-being among midlife women. Aging and Mental Health, 20(10), 1035–1043.
Demetriou, L., Hadjicharalambous, D., & Drakontaeidi, M. (2020). Psychological resilience, hope, and adaptability as protective factors in times of crisis: A study in Greek and Cypriot society during the Covid-19 pandemic. Social Education Research, 2(1), 20. https://doi.org/10.37256/ser.212021618
Feldman, C., & Kuyken, W. (2019). Mindfulness: Ancient wisdom meets modern psychology (1st ed.). Guilford Press.
Homan, K. J. (2016). Self-compassion and psychological well-being in older adults. Journal of Adult Development, 23(5), 111–119.
Klasa, K., Galaitsi, S., & Wister, A. (2021). System models for resilience in gerontology: Application to the COVID-19 pandemic. BMC Geriatrics, 21(4), 51.
Manning, L. K., & Bouchard, L. (2020). Encounters with adversity: A framework for understanding resilience in later life. Aging and Mental Health, 24(7), 1108–1115.
Neff, K. (2015). Self-compassion: The proven power of being kind to yourself (First William Morrow paperback ed.). William Morrow, an imprint of HarperCollins.
Neff, K., & Germer, C. (2018). The mindful self-compassion workbook: A proven way to accept yourself, build inner strength, and thrive. The Guilford Press.
Phillips, W., & Ferguson, S. (2013). Self-compassion: A resource for positive aging. The Journals of Gerontology. Series B, Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 68(4), 529–539.
