Applications for psych - Stress

Seyle 1936, 1983 definition for stress

Nonspecific response of the body to any demand for change.

Eustress

•A positive psychological response to a stressor, as indicated by the presence of positive psychological states such as feeling enthusiastic and motivated, excited, active and alert.
•Typically short term and can provide the energy and motivation needed to achieve a goal or peak performance.
•Not considered to be harmful or damaging to the body.

Distress

•A negative psychological response to a stressor, as indicated by the presence of negative psychological states such as anger, anxiety, nervousness, irritability or tension.
•Distress can be short-term but, for some stressors, can also persist for weeks, months or even years if it is not addressed and managed.
•Prolonged distress can have serious and debilitating consequences for our physical and mental health.

Stressors

•Stressors are stimuli that cause or produce stress and challenge our ability to cope.

Characteristics of a stressor - nature

•An internal stressor originates within the individual; for example, a personal problem that causes stress potential consequences or the experience of physical pain.
•An external stressor originates outside the individual from situations and events in the environment; for example, having too much homework or being in an overcrowded train

Characteristics of a stressor - Duration

Acute stressors are short-term exposure such as daily hassles (like work deadlines) and episodic life events (like breakups).
Chronic stressors are ongoing stressors lasting for six months or more,

Characteristics of a stressor - Strength

The strength of the stressor is related to the perceived threat level and different people may react differently to the same situation based on their perception of threat.

Characteristics of a stressor - environmental

• Stressors that arise from aspects of one's surroundings.
• For example - large noisy crowds.

Characteristics of a stressor - Psychological

Stressors that arise from events or situations that challenge an individual's mental or emotional balance; they are often subjective and varying significantly from person to person.

Characteristics of a stressor - social

Stressors that arise from aspects of social interactions and societal structures .

Characteristics of a stressor - cultural

Stressors that arise from conflicting cultural norms, values, and expectations experienced by individuals who navigate between two or more cultures.

Stress as a Response - Selye

• stress is the body's physiological response to both physical and psychological demands and it represents the body's generalised effort to adapt itself to new conditions.
• Any stressor such as an emergency or an imposing demand at school, initiates a sympathetic nervous system response such as increases in heart and breathing rate.
  ° These are nonspecific reactions to stress that occur regardless of the type of stressor.
• Specific reactions that are appropriate to particular stressors can also occur.

General adaptation syndrome description

• A three-stage physiological response to stress that occurs regardless of the stressor that is encountered.
  ° This means that the GAS is non-specific and will occur whatever the source of the stressor.
  ±The GAS model highlights the body's capacity to adapt and resist stressors initially.
• However, prolonged or intense stress can lead to exhaustion if the body's resources are not replenished.
• Selye's research underscored the link between chronic stress and various health problems..

General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS): Alarm

• The initial response that occurs when an organism becomes aware of the stressor.
  oThis is a general defensive reaction, and results in a state of alertness, and a readiness to respond to the stressor.
• At first, the body goes into a temporary state of shock, and its resistance / ability to deal with the stress falls below its normal level.
  oPhysiologically, the body reacts as if it were injured; for example, blood pressure and body temperature drop.
• The body then rebounds from this level with a reaction called counter shock.
  oThe sympathetic nervous system is activated, adrenaline is released and the body's resistance to the stressor increases.
  oThe hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis may also be activated, producing cortisol.
  oPhysiological symptoms include increased heart rate and breathing rate
  oPsychological symptoms include fear or anger

General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS): Resistance

• If the stressor is not dealt with immediately, energy is still required and the body will continue responding to cope with and adapt to the stressor.

• The parasympathetic nervous system decreases the intense arousal of the alarm stage but physiological arousal remains at a level above normal (even though heart and respiration rates may have slowed down).

• Since the body is being taxed to generate resistance, all unnecessary physiological processes (such as digestion) are shut down.

• Cortisol continues to be released into the blood stream which helps energise the body to deal with the original stressor.

General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS): Exhaustion

• If the stressor is not dealt with successfully during the resistance stage, the body may reach a stage of exhaustion.
  oPhysiological symptoms include fatigue, muscle aches and headaches
  oPsychological symptoms include depression, anxiety and lack of motivation.
• During the exhaustion stage, some of the alarm reaction changes may reappear, but the body cannot sustain its resistance and the effects of the stressor can no longer be dealt with.
• As the organism has been trying to deal with the stressor for a prolonged time, its resources have been depleted and its resistance to disease is very weak.
  oProlonged high levels of cortisol suppresses the immune system.
  oWhat Selye called diseases of adaption may occur such as hypertension, gastrointestinal problems and heart disease.

Stress as a Stimulus (Social readjustment scale)

•Stress as stimulus treats stress as a life event or change that acts as an independent variable and that demands response, adjustment, or adaptation.

•The stress as stimulus theory assumes:
oChange is inherently stressful.
oLife events demand the same levels of adjustment across the population.
oThere is a common threshold of adjustment beyond which illness will result.
•Rahe and Holmes initially viewed the human subject as a passive recipient of stress, one who played no role in determining the degree, intensity, or valence of the stressor

Social Readjustment Scale 1967

•Holmes and Rahe believed that any event that required an individual to adjust their lifestyle, and their established ways of thinking, feeling and behaving, would cause stress in varying amounts, depending on the event and the level of readjustment required.
•This scale identifies 43 major life events—whether positive or negative—that might necessitate significant adjustment and induce stress.

How to score social readjustment scale

•To score your stress levels, you decide whether each of the events (called Life Change Units, or LCUs) has happened to you in the last two years and select Yes or No.
•Each life event is differently weighted and the combined 'score' of all events you said yes to is your score

Holmes and Rahe studied the relationship between stress and illness while constructing the scale.
•They examined the medical records and interviews of more than 500 patients.
•They asked US adults which of these LCUs they'd experienced in the previous two years and to rate the relative amount of readjustment that they judged would be required by each of the 43 events.
•This allowed Holmes and Rahe to work out the relative weight of different types of stress.
•For example, the "Death of a spouse" has the highest LCU value of 100, indicating it's the most stressful event on the list whereas the least stressful was "Minor violations of the law" which has the lowest value of 11.

Their research showed them the point at which someone's combined stress load was likely to put them at risk of developing health problems.

•By adding up LCUs experienced over a year, we can predict the likelihood of a major health breakdown in the subsequent two years:
§Less than 150 LCUs: 30% chance of stress-related issues.
§150-299 LCUs: 50% chance of stress-related issues.
§Over 300 LCUs: 80% chance of stress-related illness.

Social Readjustment Scale 1967 - Sciency inquiry link

•The SRS is an example of a check list - a subjective quantitative data collection method.
•It may have issues with external validity as it is Western centric (ie. Christmas is listed as an LCU) and doesn't take into account cultural differences in the perception of stresssful events.

Transactional theory (lazarus and Folkman) 1985

• Stress is the relationship between the person and the environment that is appraised as personally significant and as exceeding resources for coping.
  oViews stress as a product of a transaction between a person and their complex environment
  •Transaction because a person's ability to cope and adjust to challenges and problems is a consequence of interactions that occur between a person and their environment.
  ¡Stress responses depends on the persons appraisals of the stressor and their ability to cope with it
  oThe level of stress a person experiences is directly related to how confident he or she feels about dealing with a threat.

oThe way we interpret or react to an event can often have a more powerful impact on our stress level than the event itself.

Transactional theory - Role of Cognitive Appraisal

The transactional model of stress and coping conceptualises stress and coping as a process based on changing cognitive appraisals.

Transactional theory - primary appraisal

• We evaluate the significance of the event and whether anything is at stake in this encounter.

• For example, we may ask questions such as 'Is this something I have to deal with?', 'Am I in trouble?', 'Is there any benefit' and 'Does this matter to me?'

• The outcome of a primary appraisal is a decision about whether the event is:

• Irrelevant - has no significant impact on an individual's well-being, neither harmful nor beneficial.

• Benign-positive - positive and beneficial to an individual's wellbeing.

• Stressful - negative or challenging to an individual's well-being.

• If we decide that the situation is stressful, then we engage in additional appraisals that involve deciding if a situation is harmful, threatening and/or challenging.

• harm/loss — an assessment of how much damage has already occurred (e.g. 'I have lost my job')

• threat — an assessment of harm/loss that may not have yet occurred but could occur in the future (e.g. 'I mightn't be able to afford the rent')

• challenge — an assessment of the potential for personal gain or growth from the situation (e.g. 'I'll get any other job I can and will learn to budget and save money')

Role of cognitive appraisal - Secondary appraisal

• We then evaluate our ability to control or overcome the situation in which we find ourselves.
• This includes an evaluation of our coping options and resources for dealing with the event.
• The coping options and resources available may be internal (e.g. strength and determination) or external (e.g. money and support from family or friends).
• If the coping demands of the situation are perceived as being far greater than the resources that are available, then we are likely to experience a stress response.
• The discrepancy that is perceived may also trigger a search for additional or new resources that can be used to cope with the stress.

Problem Focused - Methods of coping - Transactional Theory

Involves efforts to alter or eliminate the source of the stress
-More likely to occur and more effective if the stressor is something we have control over.
-Problem focused coping skills include:
-Confronting the problem - aggressive efforts to alter the situation and tackle the problem head on.

-Seeking social support - turning to friends, family, or other support networks for advice or emotion comfort.

-Planful problem solving - deliberate problem-focused efforts to alter the situation combined with an analytic approach to solving the problem

Emotion Focused - Methods of coping - Transactional Theory

• Aimed at regulating the negative emotional consequences of the stressor.

• More likely to occur and more effective if the stressor is something we have little control over.

• Emotion focused coping skills include:

• Self-controlling - regulating one's feelings and actions.

• I tried to keep my feelings to myself.

• Distancing - detaching oneself and minimising the significance of the situation.

• Didn't let it get to me; refused to think too much about it.

• Positive reappraisal - creating positive meaning by focusing on personal growth.

• "I rediscovered what is important in life."

• Accepting responsibility - acknowledging one's own role in the problem.

• "I realised I brought the problem on myself"

• Escape/Avoidance - wishful thinking to escape or avoid the problem.

Coping Strategies

An action, a series of actions, or a thought process used in meeting a stressful or unpleasant situation or in modifying one's reaction to such a situation.

Adaptive Coping Strategies

•Healthy and constructive ways of dealing with stress.
•Examples include:
oSeeking social support
oRelaxation Techniques like deep breathing or meditation
oExercise
oHealthy sleep patterns
oUsing problem-solving skills to actively addressing the issue

•Adaptive coping promotes long-term well-being and allow individuals return to normal activities and social functioning.
•They also operate as a protective factor that decreases the adverse effects of life stressors when they occur by developing resilience.

Maladaptive Coping Strategies

•Unhealthy and destructive ways of dealing with stress.
•Often involve avoidance behaviours.
•Examples include:
oSubstance abuse
oBinge eating
oSocial withdrawal
oNegative self-talk and blaming

•Maladaptive coping is less helpful in managing the threat in the short-term and may lead to distress and negatively impact psychological well-being in the long-term.
oFor example - negative self talk can contribute to depression and anxiety
•Reliance on maladaptive coping also negatively impacts physical health, leading to increased susceptibility to various health conditions, including cardiovascular diseases and compromised immune function.
oFor example - Substance abuse such as alcoholism can lead to addiction and related health consequences.