Is there such a thing as the holistic bandwidth of 'resilience'?

In preparing my presentation for World Conference on Complex Systems 2026 (WCCS26) next month^, I am reading:

Bridging the Macro and the Micro by Considering the Meso: Reflections on the Fractal Nature of Resilience

ABSTRACT. We pursued the following three interconnected points: (1) there are unexplored opportunities for resilience scholars from different disciplines to cross-inspire and inform, (2) a systems perspective may enhance understanding of human resilience in health and social settings, and (3) resilience is often considered to be fractal, i.e., a phenomenon with recognizable or recurring features at a variety of scales. Following a consideration of resilience from a systems perspective, we explain how resilience can, for analytic purposes, be constructed at four scales: micro, meso, macro, and cross-scale. Adding to the cross-scale perspective of the social-ecological field, we have suggested an analytical framework for resilience studies of the health field, which incorporates holism and complexity by embracing an ecological model of cognition, something supported by empirical studies of organizations in crisis situations at various spatial as well as temporal scales.  

Key Words: human resilience; organizational resilience; resilience; resilience engineering; societal resilience 

Since the turn of the millennium, it appears 'resilience' has exploded across the media, and literature. As a result, it has also been viewed negatively by mental health service advocates, and activists as they decry the run-down state of formal services. The 'recovery model', undoubtedly closely associated with personal resilience is not the only answer.

This paper is helpful, in several respects but specifically to illustrate the idea of how Hodges' model can frame holistic bandwidth, across its care / knowledge domains.

INDIVIDUAL

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    INTERPERSONAL    :     SCIENCES               

HUMANISTIC --------------------------------------  MECHANISTIC      

SOCIOLOGY  :   POLITICAL 

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GROUP

individual - emotional - mental resilience	resilience engineering
human & societal resilience	organizational resilience

 

I think the answer is yes. 

But, what do you think (h2cmng AT yahoo.co.uk)?

Bergström, J., & Dekker, S. W. A. (2014). Bridging the Macro and the Micro by Considering the Meso: Reflections on the Fractal Nature of Resilience. Ecology and Society, 19(4), art22.
https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-06956-190422

 

See also:

Jones P. (2014) Using a conceptual framework to explore the dimensions of recovery and their relationship to service user choice and self-determination. International Journal of Person Centered Medicine. Vol 3, No 4, (2013) pp.305-311.  

 

Previously: 'complexity' : 'resilience' : 'holistic bandwidth' : 'fractal'

^Fingers x'd!

'Health - Illness': Status - presence - absence - Being

A pre-charity shop revisit: 

'So long as we are healthy, we do not notice that we are healthy. Health is one of those phenomena that we do not perceive as anything special because they are a part of everyday life. We discover them by their absence. Only illness enables us to see health as health. That I am healthy, and in what way I am healthy, is something I experience when, and to the extent that, I am or was not healthy, or when I perceive (but this it is difficult to do) that, and to what extent, someone else is or was not healthy. Being healthy is not the only 'being' that escapes our gaze precisely by being, and that appears to us by its absence. One could say the same of being as such.' p.257.

von Weizsäcker, Carl Friedrich (1971 [1980 trans.]). Einheit der Natur [The Unity of Nature] New York: Farrar Straus Giroux.

If we are to demonstrate ('prove') that Hodges' model can be applied, is relevant in:

• illness, disease, trauma (physical and mental);
• health and well-being; 
• human development, ageing, pregnancy;
• social care; 
• preventive medicine, health promotion, health education;
• life sciences, bioengineering; 
• public (community and mental) health;
• self care;
• spiritual health;
• and global - planetary (political) health ...

Then these observations by Friedrich, allied with definitions of health, as per the WHO's Constitution:

'Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.'
https://www.who.int/about/governance/constitution

The oft cited (when I was a student nurse) definition of nursing by Virginia Henderson:

“Assisting the individual, sick or well, in the performance of those activities contributing to health or its recovery (or to peaceful death) that an individual would perform unaided if he had the necessary strength, will or knowledge”.
https://libguides.twu.edu/c.php?g=270174&p=1803121

We need to 'see' beyond these sources, to take in the global situation. But, being situated this is something Hodges' model is ideally equipped to achieve.

Affordances

Affordance

An affordance is a perceptual pattern with survival significance. Affordances are relational, rather than objective or subjective properties. As Gibson, who coined the term, observes, 'An important fact about the affordances of the environment is that they are in a sense objective, real, and physical, unlike values and meanings, which are often supposed to be subjective, phenomenal and mental. But, actually, an affordance is neither an objective property nor a subjective property; or it is both if you like. An affordance cuts across the dichotomy of subjective-objective and helps us to understand its inadequacy' (Gibson 1979, 129). 
[Proust, Glossary, p.309.]

 

INDIVIDUAL

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HUMANISTIC --------------------------------------  MECHANISTIC      

SOCIOLOGY  :   POLITICAL 

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GROUP

subjective	objective

Re. 'Survival significance' ...

Does this make affordances relevant in clinical education, and education more generally?

What of assisted dying in theory, policy, law and practice?

Are there any implications for the models employed by artificial intelligence - LLMs, neurosymbolic reasoning / AI (wave x)?

Source: Joëlle Proust (2013). The Philosophy of Metacognition: Mental Agency and Self-Awareness.  Oxford: Oxford University Press, Oxford. ISBN: 978-0-19-960216-2

Précis of The Philosophy of Metacognition:
https://joelleproust.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/pdf15.pdf 

See also: 'subject' : 'object' : 'affordance' : 'interface'

Come on Healthcare: catch up will you!

Within philosophy it is recognised that Immanuel Kant provided a means by which the rationalists and empricists can be reconciled. Some background:

In philosophy, rationalism is the epistemological view that "regards reason as the chief source and test of knowledge"[1] or "the position that reason has precedence over other ways of acquiring knowledge",[2] often in contrast to other possible sources of knowledge such as faith, tradition, or sensory experience. More formally, rationalism is defined as a methodology or a theory "in which the criterion of truth is not sensory but intellectual and deductive".[3]  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rationalism

In philosophy, empiricism is an epistemological view which holds that true knowledge or justification comes only or primarily from sensory experience and empirical evidence.[1] It is one of several competing views within epistemology, along with rationalism and skepticism. Empiricists argue that empiricism is a more reliable method of finding the truth than purely using logical reasoning, because humans have cognitive biases and limitations which lead to errors of judgement.[2] Empiricism emphasizes the central role of empirical evidence in the formation of ideas, rather than innate ideas or traditions.[3] Empiricists may argue that traditions (or customs) arise due to relations of previous sensory experiences.[4]

Historically, empiricism was associated with the "blank slate" concept (tabula rasa), according to which the human mind is "blank" at birth and develops its thoughts only through later experience.[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empiricism

If health and social care, must be evidence-based, then as far as Hodges' model is concerned we are then duty-bound to use the most readily available 'evidence' to us, including (while taking liberties?):

• The structure of national health and social care organisations (NHS, DHSS ...)
• Physical infrastructure
• Human Resources Organisation
• Unions and Labour relations
• Texbooks, journal papers, conferences
• Organisational structures from the regional to the local
• Professional bodies and governance of licensing/registration
• Curricula that students follow^
  
• Models, frameworks, teaching and learning tools and methods
• Data, statistics, information and reporting (national, international)
• Research projects ongoing (whatever scale, methods, methodology)
• Accounts from lived experience of patients, carers and public (^and students)
• Policy
• Funding
• Law relating to Health and Social Care
• Public (Mental) Health? Discuss
• Media (Social) Control, Advertising
• . . .
  

Hodges' model: Structure and Content

Using this evidence, we still see the Cartesian divide, the mind-body distinction writ large in health and social care. The continuing impact is evident in theory, practice, (hence) lived experience, policy and managment. Since its creation in the 1980s, Hodges' model mirrors (literally) this philosophical, epistemological and ontological legacy, thereby acknowledging the ancient history of medicine, and 'modern' development of healthcare and nursing. Through this device, Hodges' model can facilitate debate, critique, reflection, and critical thinking; to encourage progress in our thought, motivations, action and subsequent evaluation.

This explains the structure of Hodges' model and predicts the range (contextual signature) of content when the model is applied.

Evidence permitting of course!

See also: BBC The Great Philosophers:

Series 1: 4. Descartes

Series 1: 5. Spinoza and Leibniz

Series 1: 8. Kant

n.b. I video taped this marvellous series when first screened. When studying for my BA(Hons), audio taped, they also provided a great learning resource in the car. The programmes are on BBC 4 (UK) once again, but are readily accessible.

Book: 'The Sleep Room' by Jon Stock i

Somewhat indirectly - I must emphasize, a book review reminded me of my Registered Mental Nursing student nursing days; and the mind - body divide. Without realising it then I heard the sound of two keys out of the five in Hodges' model. There were positive role models in the staff nurses involved; plus, learning in the routes and modalities of physical and psychological responses to treatments; in the form of medication and therapy. 

'The Sleep Room' highlights the dangers of unbounded belief in recourse to physical treatments. Such books are designed of course to 'sell', to be emotive, sensational. But mental illness - the asylum systems, presents a history of humanistic intent and mechanistic horrors. If mental illness, severe emotional responses can render us as a rag-doll, pursuit of physicalist solutions to the nth degree, is tantamount to shaking the doll: violently.

individual

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INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

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group

mental	physical  treatment
SOCIO-	resistance? -POLITICS of health

More to follow - ii ...

Sansom, I. Abused by a 'hero' of British medicine, Review. The Daily Telegraph, 29 March 2025. p.15. 

'Critical Notes on the Nature of Sociology as a Science'

4Ps

As a model of care (education, management, safety, systems, ...)*, or a conceptual model, conceptual framework, or however described, Hodges' model, as with its many peers is idealised.

You quickly 'see' that the 4Ps I've associated with the knowledge - care domains of Hodges' model are far specific, or limited to that domain alone.

In our dialogues, media and literature it becomes obvious that in addition to physical, sequential, and  natural (scientific) processes, there are also political,  sociological, and psychological, or mental  (interpersonal) processes.

I've always been drawn to the diagonal distances between the interpersonal-political domains; and that between the sociological-scientific. The latter I think about often as it makes the news regularly, when education is raised, literacy, the state of our schools, colleges, universities and (globally) the public's understanding of the sciences. So finding a paper heading for its centennial birthday caught my attention. Not just that, but the journal - Social Forces is (very much!) still with us aged 103 this year. Unsurprisingly, I like the way Woodard contrasts the mechanistic and humanistic:

Hodges' model

'For there is a further distinction to be made among evaluations of functional appropriateness. I may analyze the functional appropriateness of the gears and pulleys of a machine. That is applied mechanics, not the pure science of mechanics. For the function of the machine is tacked on to it arbitrarily and does not emerge from the data of the science of mechanics. But the same may not be said of hearts and lungs, of mental and emotional processes, or of social structures, functions, and processes. Here the functions are not extraneously tacked onto an arbitrarily assembled collation. They are inescapable emergents from the process of scientific analysis and are warp and woof of our data as it confronts us, in situ, in the natural universe. They are not in any sense superimposed.' p.32.

Interesting point regarding 'hearts and lungs' - to possibly return to? Also, as a template Hodges' model provides a 'warp and woof' for data gathering - a foundation.

Woodard, J. W. (1932). Critical Notes on the Nature of Sociology as a Science. Social Forces, 11(1), 28–43. https://doi.org/10.2307/2569615 

*Please give it a try whatever your field, and let me know your thoughts. ... h2cmng AT yahoo.co.uk

Frayn's - shared 'Home Address'

Frequently I've made the point that 'person-centred' means placing the individual, patient, carer ... whatever the context, at the centre of Hodges' model. At the same time this is of course an idealisation:

individual

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INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

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group

What is your 'home' address?

'Science, it turns out, is in this respect simply an extension of all the other means we have found of representing the world. As with pictures and narratives, the world is unimaginable without the focus of a viewpoint. To understand the world in any way whatsoever scientifically, historically, artistically, anecdotally, imaginatively we find ourselves compelled to assume a potential point of convergence from which everything is  viewed, measured, and recounted. About the entity that defines this point we know only that it is by definition invisible to us. And since the instruments of science, of logic and mathematics, and of art, are all products of this invisible entity, they will not serve to represent or explain it to us. Anything in the world, or out of it, can be perceived or thought about, or both, and represented in our various codes. The only thing that systematically eludes us, whichever way we turn, is the something upon which everything else depends. The conscious subject that gives meaning to the objective universe cannot give meaning to itself. Without it nothing can be understood; about it nothing can be said.  'The point of convergence . . .' And already we've gone wrong. The self isn't a point, in any remotely geometrical sense, but a complex organisation; and the consciousness that it generates, and by which it is animated, is a complex phenomenon.' pp.401-402. (my emphasis)

Frayn, Michael (2006). The human touch: our part in the creation of a universe. 'Home Address', Chapter 5. London: Faber & Faber. 

A final post from my paperback copy, next - off to a good secondhand home. Previously: 'Frayn'.

'Science' - Air Pollution

Science

• Volume 385|
• Issue 6707|
• 26 Jul 2024

COVER
"Smoke from wildfires burning in Canada enveloped New York City, New York, in June of 2023, shown here in a photo of the Chrysler Building on 7 June. Wildfire smoke events in the past decade have halted or reversed positive air quality trends in the United States. This special issue considers recent developments in monitoring, health effects, and policy dealing with air pollution. See the section beginning on page 378."

individual

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INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

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group

Lyons, S., Nolan, A., Carthy, P. et al. Long-term exposure to PM2.5 air pollution and mental health: a retrospective cohort study in Ireland. Environ Health 23, 54 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12940-024-01093-z Ferreira, et al. (2024). Impact of Air Quality on Mental Health of Higher Education Students. In: Galvão, et al. (eds) Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Water Energy Food and Sustainability (ICoWEFS 2023). ICoWEFS 2023. Springer Proceedings in Earth and Environmental Sciences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-48532-9_37 Shaw, S., Kundu, S., Chattopadhyay, A. et al. Indoor air pollution and cognitive function among older adults in India: a multiple mediation approach through depression and sleep disorders. BMC Geriatr 24, 81 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12877-024-04662-6

Shine, S., Tamirie, M., Kumie, A. et al. Pregnant women’s perception on the health effects of household air pollution in Rural Butajira, Ethiopia: a phenomenological qualitative study. BMC Public Health 23, 1636 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-023-16578-8 Phillip, E., Conroy, R.M., Walsh, A. et al. Using mixed methods and community participation to explore household and ambient air pollution practices in a rural community in Malawi. J Public Health (Berl.) (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10389-023-02008-x

Nakaishi, T., Yoo, S., Kagawa, S. et al. Impact of air pollution on human morality: A multinational perspective. Humanit Soc Sci Commun 11, 991 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-024-03186-z Wang, K. Is air pollution politics or economics? Evidence from industrial heterogeneity. Environ Sci Pollut Res 30, 24454–24469 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-23955-0 Wang, X., Tan, H. & Liu, J. The impact of air pollution on commercial health insurance demand amidst China's green transition. Econ Change Restruct 57, 39 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10644-024-09623-y

Price, H.D., Bowyer, C.J., Büker, P. et al. From reflection diaries to practical guidance for transdisciplinary research: learnings from a Kenyan air pollution project. Sustain Sci 18, 1429–1444 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11625-023-01317-0

My source:  https://x.com/DrMariaNeira

https://x.com/DrMariaNeira/status/1819399316735144414

Previously 'pollution'

Book (i): Mental Patient - Psychiatric Ethics from a Patient's Perspective

- by Abigail Gosselin

Individual
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HUMANISTIC  --------------------------------------  MECHANISTIC      

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Group

Book: Mental Patient	Do we say  "PHYSICAL PATIENT"?
What is (still) heard here?	What is still heard here?

Gosselin, A. (2022). Mental Patient: Psychiatric Ethics from a Patient’s Perspective. The MIT Press.
https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/14589.001.0001

My source: 

https://x.com/AnneMarieGagnJ1/status/1767948059957227719?s=20

'Mechanical medicine' is a thing ...

Planet Medicine

"Mechanical Medicine: Ancient surgery, poultices; some herbal medicine and bodywork; all Western technological medicine. 

Since healing occurs in the physical world, all medicines must have some substance, if only the substance from which a potency is derived or the bodies of the participants. The acupuncture needles are not pure energy, and the herbs of the Ayurvedic or Basque doctor grow from real soil; even the mind has the external properties of the brain. The San Pedro cactus of Peru which, according to Eduardo Calderon, transfers its light and vibration to the patient and locks with his aura to drive all physical and mental aspects of alienation to the surface, originates in the physical properties of the desert." p.374.

Grossinger, R. (1982) Planet Medicine - from stone age shamanism to post-industrial healing, London: Shambala Publications Inc.

Book cover: Ebay.

Descartes' asunder c/o Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine

 I THINK therefore I AM       

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GROUP

Original image: MindBody

© Pain Scale for Chronic Patients ‘MindBody’ by Sal Marx Fall 2021

In Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine
Copyright ©2022  ISSN 2766-628X

Previously: 'Cartesian'

Agnotology - (a) space for ignorance?

 Chapter 1 of Agnotology (Proctor, 2008) begins with two quotations:

“We are often unaware of the scope and structure of our ignorance. Ignorance
is not just a blank space on a person's mental map. It has contours and coher-
ence, and for all I know rules of operation as well. So as a corollary to writing
about what we know, maybe we should add getting familiar with our ignorance.”
Thomas Pynchon, 1984

“Doubt is our product.”
Brown & Williamson Tobacco Company, internal memo, 1969

The discovery of this book and its title, was quite an event.

Proctor, Robert N. and Schiebinger, Londa (Eds.). AGNOTOLOGY The Making And Unmaking Of Ignorance. (2008): Stanford University Press, Stanford, California.

 

 

Previously on W2tQ:

'ignorance'

'smoking'

"All in the Mind" (and model): Ambiguous Loss

"Have you ever lost a loved one who was still a part of your life in some way? Did it leave you feeling confused or frozen about how to continue with life? Claudia Hammond examines the distressing phenomenon known as ambiguous loss – the enormous challenge of dealing with a loss when you aren’t sure what’s happened, leaving you searching for answers, unable to move on." 

BBC Radio 4 "All in the Mind" 1st December, 2020 (Available for one year)

 individual

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INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ----------------------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

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group

psychological ambiguous loss ambivalence, grief, loss guilt, reality, meaning BOTH-AND thinking -	physical ambiguous loss a body is missing head injury - the impact of dementia on a person

 

In my mind's eye I can picture care: Frame by Frame

individual

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INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ----------------------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

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group

Aphantasia - unable to visualise mental images Ed	Animation Frame by Frame Aphantasia - 2.5% of people may have it Requires memory plus areas in the frontal, parietal, temporal, and occipital lobes to work together.
Catmull ... has "blind mind's eye"	... a former Pixar President

Additional links:

Can’t count sheep? You could have aphantasia

Aphantasia: Losing the mind’s eye 

Low, V. Picture this: the top animators who can't draw mental images, The Times, Wednesday, April 10, 2019, p.24.

UK Systems Society presentation: Missing the obvious...

individual

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INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic --------------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

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group

Psychological systems	Physical systems
Social systems	Political systems

Individual choice & life chances c/o Mark Power

individual

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INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic --------------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

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group

PRACTICE	POLICY

Photo and source with thanks: Harlan, Kentucky, December 2015 @copy Mark Power

My source: Requiem for a dream, David Chandler, 2018 FT Magazine, March 3-4.

comment: Activities of Daily Living ADLs and Hodges' model [1]

Guy Dewsbury got in touch through LinkedIn in response to the ADL post [1]:

On 12/01/09 6:49 AM, Guy Dewsbury wrote:
--------------------
Hi Peter
Really like your post on ADLs, but it seems that ADLs whenever they are used omit the need of the person in preference to the risk associated with them. I am sure you would agree, that is why I tend to pay a passing nod to ADLs but instead concentrate on what the person actually wants and aspires to and see how this can be achieved.

I wonder what your take on this is. I would have thought that aspiration and need are critical in mental health as well, in fact I would posit that by concentrating on ADLs it is easier to omit looking beyond them to the real needs of the person.
Over to you..
Guy

On 12/01/09, Peter Jones wrote:
--------------------
Hi Guy
Thanks for your comments and feedback. I quite agree - in a way that's what the blog post is saying. If you look at the basic ADLs they are 'placed' or associated with the sciences - processes - physical tasks. That's why I highlighted some of the psychological aspects in the intra-interpersonal domain.

For example, in future posts I may add the way that there are a lot of people with quite chronic respiratory problems, but they carry on as their behaviour has modified such that they know they can no longer run for the bus. Although an assessment of respiration may reveal their (medical) problem their needs are elsewhere.

Perhaps - if you don't mind - I could post your reply and my note above on the blog as a follow-up - since the comments are disabled.

Cheers Guy appreciate your getting in touch.
Peter J.

--------------------
Guy Dewsbury has sent you a message.
Date: 12/02/2009
Hi Peter
Happy for you to post anything you want.
Great reply too
Guy

Image source: Running for the bus - Jess and James