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Measuring an Individual’s Recovery Barriers and Strengths

In 2008, Granfield and Cloud defined recovery capital as “the sum total of one’s resources that can be brought to bear on the initiation and maintenance of substance use cessation.” These authors discussed the four component parts of recovery capital as social, human, physical and cultural. They also introduced the idea of “negative recovery capital” to indicate that certain circumstances (a significant history of mental health problems, a history of engagement with the criminal justice system, older age and female gender) constitute barriers to recovery.