Coping-Related Insight as a Mechanism of Resilience Capacity Development in Emerging Adulthood: A Registered Report.

The Systematic Self-Reflection Model of Resilience Strengthening (Crane, Searle, et al., 2019) proposes that coping self-reflection on everyday stressors can generate coping-related insights that refine modifiable capacities for resilience (e.g., coping beliefs, coping adjustment, and coping-enabling resources), thereby increasing the likelihood of resilience. However, reflective engagement and insight generation may be constrained by individual and contextual factors, raising the possibility that externally modeled coping insights could scaffold subsequent self-reflection and strengthen downstream adaptation. This preregistered study tests whether narrative exposure that explicitly models coping-related insights enhances the effects of structured self-reflection among emerging adults (18-25 years). Participants (target final N = 400; recruited from Australia and the United Kingdom) will be randomly assigned to one of three conditions: (1) high-insight priming story + reflection, in which short video stories explicitly convey a coping-related insight; (2) low-insight priming story + reflection, in which the same stories omit explicit meaning-making; or (3) reflection-only. Participants complete five weekly tasks, with assessments at baseline (T1), post-intervention (T2), and 3-month follow-up (T3). Primary outcomes include coping-related insight (self-report and blind-coded written insights), resilient capacities (coping self-efficacy, coping adjustment, support-seeking intentions, perceived social support), and mental ill-health symptoms (depression and anxiety). Resilience is operationalized as stressor reactivity, symptom levels relative to stressor exposure, calculated as residualised symptoms after accounting for adversity and daily hassles, at each time point. We hypothesize that high-insight priming narratives will increase insight and resilient capacities and reduce stressor reactivity over time. Mediation analyses will test underlying mechanisms.