A Structural Model of the Relationship of Resilience With Cognitive Flexibility and Self-differentiation in Iranian Married Female Nurses, Mediated by Marital Intimacy and Marital Adjustment

Background & Aims Background and Aim: Resilience plays an important role in tolerating work and life hardships. Identifying variables that can predict resilience is important. This study aimed to develop a structural model to determine the relationship of resilience with cognitive flexibility and self-differentiation in Iranian married female nurses, mediated by marital intimacy and marital adjustment. Materials & Methods This is a descriptive-correlational study using structural equation modeling (SEM). The study population included all married female nurses working in public hospitals and medical centers in Alborz province, Iran, in 2022. A total of 400 eligible nurses were selected using a multistage cluster sampling method. The data collection tools were the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, Dennis and Vanderwal’s 25-item Cognitive Flexibility Inventory (CFI), Skowron and Smith’s 46-item Differentiation of Self Inventory-Revised (DSI-R), Bagarozi’s Marital Intimacy Needs Questionnaire (MINQ), and the Locke-Wallace Marital Adjustment Test (MAT). Descriptive statistics and SEM were used in SPSS v.26 and Amos v.24 for data analysis. Results The mean scores of DSI-R, resilience, CFI, MINQ, MAT were 26.75±6.87, 26.98±6.74, 21.21±6.56, 23.70±6.03, and 25.23±6.40, respectively. The correlation matrix showed a positive and significant correlation between cognitive flexibility and resilience (r=0.792, P<0.001), between self-differentiation and resilience (r= 0.729, P<0.001), between marital intimacy and resilience (r=0.732, P<0.001), and between marital adjustment and resilience (r=0.712, P<0.001). The fit indices showed a good fit of the SEM model. Path analysis revealed that cognitive flexibility and self-differentiation had both direct and indirect (through marital adjustment and marital intimacy) relationships with resilience (P<0.05). Conclusion Cognitive flexibility and self-differentiation are correlated with resilience in married female nurses. Marital intimacy and marital adjustment can mediate their relationships. The hospital managers are recommended to pay attention to marital intimacy and marital adjustment of married female nurses by offering educational courses, to improve their resilience.