The Brief Resilience Scale (BRS) was developed to assess the ability to bounce back or recover from stress. It was tested on four samples, including two student samples and samples with cardiac and chronic pain patients. The BRS was found to be reliable and measured as a unitary construct. It was predictably related to personal characteristics, social relations, coping, and health in all samples. It was negatively related to anxiety, depression, negative affect, and physical symptoms when other resilience measures and optimism, social support, and Type D personality were controlled. Large differences in BRS scores were found between cardiac patients with and without Type D and women with and without fibromyalgia. The BRS is a reliable means of assessing resilience as the ability to bounce back or recover from stress and may provide unique and important information about people coping with health-related stressors. Resilience is defined as the ability to bounce back or recover from stress, rather than resistance to illness, adaptation, or thriving. Previous resilience measures have focused on resources that promote resilience rather than recovery, resistance, adaptation, or thriving. The BRS was developed to assess resilience as bouncing back from stress. It was tested on four samples and found to be reliable and valid. It was related to resilience resources and health outcomes. The BRS includes six items, with three positively and three negatively worded. It is scored by reverse coding the negatively worded items and finding the mean of the six items. The BRS is a useful tool for assessing resilience as the ability to bounce back from stress.The Brief Resilience Scale (BRS) was developed to assess the ability to bounce back or recover from stress. It was tested on four samples, including two student samples and samples with cardiac and chronic pain patients. The BRS was found to be reliable and measured as a unitary construct. It was predictably related to personal characteristics, social relations, coping, and health in all samples. It was negatively related to anxiety, depression, negative affect, and physical symptoms when other resilience measures and optimism, social support, and Type D personality were controlled. Large differences in BRS scores were found between cardiac patients with and without Type D and women with and without fibromyalgia. The BRS is a reliable means of assessing resilience as the ability to bounce back or recover from stress and may provide unique and important information about people coping with health-related stressors. Resilience is defined as the ability to bounce back or recover from stress, rather than resistance to illness, adaptation, or thriving. Previous resilience measures have focused on resources that promote resilience rather than recovery, resistance, adaptation, or thriving. The BRS was developed to assess resilience as bouncing back from stress. It was tested on four samples and found to be reliable and valid. It was related to resilience resources and health outcomes. The BRS includes six items, with three positively and three negatively worded. It is scored by reverse coding the negatively worded items and finding the mean of the six items. The BRS is a useful tool for assessing resilience as the ability to bounce back from stress.