Strength amid struggle: a mixed methods exploration of mental health, resilience, and wellbeing in Aotearoa New Zealand

For many decades, mental health and wellbeing research has focused on lived experience of mental distress; however, what is less well understood is lived experience of resilience factors and how they can be enhanced. While validated scales are widely used, the authentic voices of people themselves remain strangely muted in much of this research. This study addresses that gap by examining both quantitative indicators and participants’ own accounts of the strengths and resources that sustain their mental health and wellbeing. This study explored: (1) sociodemographic factors associated with quantitatively measured wellbeing and resilience, (2) strength-based factors which individuals identify as supporting their mental health, (3) how individuals conceptualise resilience, and (4) how strength-based narratives vary across demographic groups. A mixed-methods online survey combined quantitative measures (WHO-5 Wellbeing Index, Brief Resilience Scale) with open-ended questions inviting participants’ written perspectives on mental health supports and resilience. Quantitative data were analysed using regression analyses while free-text responses to open-ended questions underwent reflexive thematic analysis. A total of 436 participants completed the survey. Males reported significantly higher wellbeing and resilience than females, while Māori (the Indigenous people of Aotearoa, New Zealand) participants showed significantly higher resilience than non-Māori participants. Qualitative thematic analysis of open-ended survey responses revealed three interconnected domains that participants identified as supporting their mental health: individual resources and practices, social connections and support networks, and environmental and structural enablers. Through their written narratives, participants conceptualised resilience as an adaptive process, collective resource, capacity for meaning-making, and set of learnable skills. Participants understand mental health through ecological frameworks emphasizing interconnections between personal, social and environmental factors. Māori participants’ higher resilience scores challenge deficit-focused narratives and support culturally-grounded approaches to mental health and resilience. Findings suggest effective interventions must address multiple domains simultaneously, with environmental factors as prerequisites for wellbeing.