436 Community Psychology
Iscoe, 1974; Kelly, 1970, 1971, 2000; Klein, 1968; Novaco &
Monahan, 1980; Spivak & Shure, 1974, 1989). Within com-
munity psychology, the development of a strengths perspec-
tive has involved identifying the need to focus on the
strengths and resources of community structures and individ-
ual community members. The movement toward a strengths
perspective has involved terms from different areas of
knowledge. Relevant terms have included psychological
health(Jahoda, 1953, 1958), psychological wellness(Cowen,
1994, 1997, 2000b), competence(Danish, 1983; Glidewell,
1977; Iscoe, 1974; Spivack & Shure, 1989), and resilience
(Garmezy, 1991). For the purposes of this paper the term
“strengths” will be used to represent this perspective. This
perspective has served as a guiding principle for community
psychologists in their attempts to develop theory and plans
for action research. While a number of scholars have pursued
a strengths perspective as a specific research agenda (Cowen,
1997; Spivak & Shure, 1974, 1989; Weissberg, Caplan, &
Harwood, 1991), attention to this principle as a central value
in the field’s overall development has not been made explicit.
Highlighting both personal and community strengths and
resources became a priority for a number of researchers even
before the Swampscott Conference in 1965 (Bennett et al.,
1966; Cottrell, 1964; Jahoda, 1953, 1958; Lindemann, 1953;
Ojemann, 1957; White, 1952, 1959). Prior to the Swampscott
Conference, some participants were active in “such diverse
areas of national life as the Peace Corps, the anti-poverty
effort, [and] a broad movement into the field of education”
(Bennett et al., 1966, p. 4). These social change activities
began to stretch the traditional professional roles of psychol-
ogists, as well as the relationship between psychologists and
other community members who were not “clients.” Experi-
ences such as these urged psychologists to recognize and
appreciate the various strengths and resources that both com-
munities and their members possessed.
Lindemann’s Wellesley Project, as mentioned earlier in
this chapter, is an early exemplar of how social science could
pull together available community resources to promote the
mental health of community members (Lindemann, 1953).
The project began in 1948 and served as a model for shifting
the focus from disease to health. Understanding how personal
and community resources build on each other became imper-
ative to the success of the Wellesley program. Similarly,
Marie Jahoda, a social psychologist, proposed a focus on the
psychological health of individuals rather than a focus on
disease (1953, 1958). She advocated moving the definition of
psychological health beyond that of the absence of mental
disease, statistical normality, psychological well-being, or
sheer successful survival. Instead, Jahoda discussed defining
psychological health in context: “Psychological health...
manifests itself in behavior that has a promise of success
under favorable conditions” (1953, p. 351). In this way, she
supported investigating the environmental factors that both
facilitated and inhibited people from being successful, and
helped to launch research on individuals’ adaptive coping
strategies. Jahoda’s conceptualization of mental health vali-
dated the emerging strengths perspective.
Like Jahoda, Cottrell (1964), a sociologist, called for an
understanding of mental health in context, which required a
major shift in emphasis from traditional psychiatric training
or practice. In writing about the problems facing individuals,
Cottrell argued that the clinical solutions quite often held
by psychiatrists were “not likely to be comprehensive
enough for the requirements of the situation” (p. 392).
Cottrell called for a revolution in the way psychiatrists both
approached and dealt with people’s problems. This “revolu-
tion” involved identifying and strengthening the resources of
communities: “It is my expectation that in helping American
communities to discover the ways and means to become ar-
ticulate, knowledgeable, effective in achieving consensus on
values and their implementation, we are developing potent
capabilities for coping effectively” (Cottrell, 1964, p. 398).
Similar to Lindemann (1953), Cottrell believed that commu-
nities rather than psychiatrists would be best equipped to deal
with the issues faced by their members.
Lindemann, Cottrell, and Jahoda, though not explicitly
identified as community psychologists, provide examples of
social scientists moving beyond a deficits focus. They rede-
fined our conceptualization of health as not just the absence
of illness and laid the groundwork for future community psy-
chologists to apply a strengths perspective to community
research and action. As will be evident, throughout the evolu-
tion of the field’s theory and prevention research, this tenet of
community psychology has remained a consistent theme.ECOLOGICAL THEORYAs noted in the introduction, community psychology was
cultivated during a period in which social inequalities were
being challenged because of their link to the health and men-
tal illness of individuals and the disintegration of communi-
ties. Commensurate with this philosophy of social change
experienced at a societal level, community psychologists
have advocated for understanding “human competencies and
problems... within the social, cultural, and historical con-
text” (Meritt et al., 1997, p. 74). This orientation, discussed in
terms of an ecological framework, represents one of the
major theoretical frameworks guiding the field of community
psychology. This framework reflects a focus on the strengths