UI Psi Research: Indonesian People's Resilience Is Low, Can't Stand Pressure Or Pain

JAKARTA - Head of the Cognition, Affect, & Well-Being Laboratory of the Faculty of Psychology, University of Indonesia (UI) Bagus Takwin stated, in general, the average resilience (general ability, ed) of Indonesians is low.

Indonesians tend to be intolerant of pressure or pain and tend to be pessimistic about the future when they experience stressful situations that make them sad.

This was conveyed by Bagus Takwin in a webinar entitled 'Resilience in a Pandemic Period: A Study on Resilience and Its Impact on Mental Health in Indonesians.'

The webinar was held online which was attended by 614 participants via the zoom platform on Saturday, July 10, as quoted from Antara.

Bagus said, actually this resilience can be built through what is called positive affect, namely positive experiences experienced by a person when interacting with other people, or when successfully overcoming life's challenges.

"For example, when someone successfully completes a strenuous exercise session, this gives a positive affect. There are positive emotions that occur inside when you successfully complete a challenge in life," he said.

If it is associated with pandemic conditions, if this difficult situation continues for a long time, then this condition of low resilience can cause mental disorders to increase in society.

Such as difficulty concentrating, not feeling satisfied with what is being lived, difficult to make decisions and difficult to solve problems.

Head of the UI Demographic Institute, Turro S. Wongkaren, Ph.D, as one of the responders stated that resilience consists of two elements, namely resilience and flexibility.

Interestingly, the Indonesian people do not have a good bounce back against the future, tend to be satisfied with the status quo but have high flexibility (endurance) against suffering.

Lecturer of F.Psi UI Dr. SR Pudjiati, M.Si, Psychology said that to build this resilience one can be invited to recognize aspects of his internal and external characteristics.

A person must recognize his or her strengths and weaknesses (who am i?), then recognize the quality of his relationship with others (what i have?), so that then a person can identify his/her capacity realistically (what i can do?). These are simple ways that anyone can do to build resilience.

The research team consisted of Rocky AC Hatibie, S.Psi, a Psychologist, as the team leader, with Dr. Bagus Takwin, S.Psi., M.Hum., Psychologist, and Dr. Dyah Triarini Indirasari, S.Psi., MA, Psychologist, as the main researcher, and consists of Tommy Hariman Siddiq, S.Psi., MM, Psychologist, Linawaty Mustopoh, S.Psi., Psychologist, and Isdar Andre Marwan, S.Psi ., Psychologist.

This research was carried out with the aim of knowing the circumstances and factors forming resilience and recommending what actions need to be taken to improve resilience, mental health, and happiness of the Indonesian people in the midst of a pandemic.

“We hope that the results of this research can be used as an intervention material for various stakeholders to increase our resilience as a nation. This is one of the efforts of the world of education.

"In this case, the UI Faculty of Psychology is ready to assist the intervention effort, which is also part of the UI Faculty of Psychology's services to the community," said the Dean of the UI Faculty of Psychology, Dr. Tjut Rifameutia Umar Ali, MA.

This webinar is part of the series of F.Psi UI's 61st Anniversary Resilience Webinar "Resilience for the Nation" which will be held on 10, 17, 31 July, and 14 August 2021.

Other themes raised in this series of seminars included “Building a Resilient Indonesian Man”, and “Maintaining Body Immunity is Currently the Key in Facing a Pandemic.”