Posttraumatic resilience and growth: A network analysis of character strengths among sexual assault survivors.

Objective: Defined as dispositional qualities that elevate well-being, character strengths such as love and kindness can be developed and enhanced to improve quality of life. Yet, little is known how specific strengths are associated with posttrauma mental health. The present study explored their concurrent associations with posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) and posttraumatic growth (PTG) in a sample of 405 women sexual assault survivors.

Method: We applied network analysis to investigate the structure of character strengths, PTSS, and PTG, as well as to identify character strengths most strongly associated with lower PTSS and greater PTG.

Results: Results revealed that the strengths of love and forgiveness were most strongly linked to lower PTSS, whereas spirituality and kindness were most strongly linked to greater PTG.

Conclusions: These findings highlight character strengths that may be most important to cultivate in trauma-focused care for survivors. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).