Introduction Psychological resilience has been identified as a potentially modifiable trait/process that may enhance sport performance and athlete mental health. One barrier to improving resilience in female athletes is a lack of longitudinal research identifying upstream modifiable risk factors that can serve as intervention targets. Importantly, the field also lacks sufficient cross-sectional data to inform hypotheses about upstream risk factors. The primary purpose of this study was to address the gaps in both cross-sectional and longitudinal research aimed at enhancing resilience, with a focus on initial cross-sectional findings. This study also investigated whether resilience as assessed was associated with select mental health outcomes. Methods This study cross-sectionally investigated resilience in female athletes (n = 504). To be eligible, participants had to be female athletes aged 18-45 yr. Participants were recruited for an online survey study via flyers pushed through university athletic departments and other organizations (e.g., ballet companies). Participants were compensated with $25 gift cards. We identified potential modifiable risk factors hypothesized to worsen or improve resilience and correlated them with two measures of resilience commonly used in both the general population and high-performance populations (e.g., military). We also investigated how resilience differed in athletes with clinically meaningful mental health statuses. Results Resilience was significantly correlated with all upstream risk factors (emotion regulation difficulties, experiential avoidance, intolerance of uncertainty, social exchanges, and sleep difficulties). Athletes above and below clinical cutoff scores for depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder, excessive exercise/body disregard, perceived stress, and drug abuse showed significant differences in resilience; however, no differences were found for elevated female athlete triad risk and probable eating disorder. Conclusion The results of this study need to be extended in longitudinal research that could inform the development of interventions aimed at improving female athlete resilience.
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