, 2005). In humans,

developing social support and friendships (Kral et al., 2014 and Yi et al., 2005) as well as having secure relationships which reduces suicidality in veterans of Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom (Youssef et al., 2013), has been found essential to establishing resilience. Furthermore, characteristics of active coping that reduce stress and symptoms of mental illness include the following: creating a sense of coherence in their lives (Matsushita et al., 2014) or in the community (Hall et al., 2014), exercising self-control (Moses, 2014), developing a strong sense of identity including professional identity for workplace resilience (Hunter and Warren, 2014), maintaining a realistic perception of threat (Karstoft et al., BMS 754807 2013), possessing optimism (McGarry et al., 2013 and Boyson et al., 2014), having a sense of purpose (Pietrzak and Cook, 2013), and the use of problem-focused coping (Yi et al., 2005). PLX-4720 in vitro However not all coping strategies are adaptive; passive coping is characterized by feelings of helplessness, relying on others for stress resolution and is associated with vulnerability

to psychopathology (Zeidner and Norman, 1995, Folkman and Lazarus, 1980 and Billings and Moos, 1984). Consistent with this view, vulnerable individuals use passive coping strategies such as avoidance and blaming others (Yi et al., 2005). Therefore, the impact of a stressor on an individual’s first psychological well-being depends to a considerable extent on the strategy used to cope with the stressful life event. Resilience can be defined as positive adaptation, or the ability to maintain or regain mental health, despite experiencing adversity and challenges (Herrman et al., 2011 and Karatsoreos and McEwen, 2013). In order to understand the biological basis

of how some individuals are resilient to social stress and how others are vulnerable, we will focus on studies in which variations in the impact of stress are observed. That is, the focus is on studies in which subgroups of individuals defined as vulnerable or resilient emerge following exposure to the same stressor and not on studies that examine mechanisms that modify the impact of social stress homogenously in all subjects. This is because not all mechanisms that uniformly reduce the impact of stress necessarily underlie resilience. They may underlie resilience or they may not, but focusing on studies in which subpopulations emerge will allow the determination of those specific mechanisms demonstrated to underlie resilience and/or vulnerability. Further, because of the robust impact that stress has on mental health, we have a particular focus on those studies in which measures related to psychopathology are assessed. Furthermore, in clinical literature, varying coping strategies have been associated with differences in susceptibility to stress-related pathology.