[Resourcefulness Theory and Its Research and Application in Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing]

Resourcefulness theory has been developed and applied for nearly four decades in the West and been recommended by scholars in Taiwan for almost two decades. Research into the concept and theory of resourcefulness has been conducted in the nursing profession, especially in psychiatric and mental health nursing, in Taiwan, making the country the earliest Chinese and Taiwanese culture to adopt and use this theory. The concept of resourcefulness was derived from psychology and refers to the ability to effectively use internal (personal) and external (social) resources. It thus covers the two dimensions of skills application (e.g., personal resourcefulness and social resourcefulness). Beyond applying the concept of resourcefulness in academia and in the clinical practice of psychology and nursing, an instrument, the Resourcefulness Scale, has also been developed to measure resourcefulness with robust reliability and validity. Resourcefulness has been studied and tested in different populations, including patients with mental illness, elderly, adolescents, caregivers, nurses, and others, and has been found to correlate with depressive symptoms, self-harm behaviors, work stress, care burden, adaptation functioning, recovery, and quality of life. Moreover, resourcefulness training based on theory of resourcefulness and quality of life has also been fully developed and tested. The evolution of resourcefulness theory may be expected to be rooted and developed broadly to benefit more populations. The scientific development of psychiatric and mental health nursing may be seen in another field.