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Mental Health Musings

Mental Health Musings

Ep. 2: Stress Management

What Is Stress?

DEFINING STRESS

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Stressor: A stimulus with the potential for triggering the fight-or-flight response

Types of stressors:

Environmental (e.g., heat or cold)

Psychological (e.g., threats to self-esteem or depression)

Sociological (e.g., unemployment)

Philosophical (e.g., purpose in life)

Guilt associated with behaving in ways contrary to one’s belief system or moral framework (e.g., cheating)

Regardless of the stressor, the body’s reaction will be the same.

Stress reactivity: How people individually react to stressors

Acute stress reactivity: The immediate reaction to a stressor; when the stressor is removed, the stress response ends

Strains: The physical, psychological, and behavioral outcomes of stress reactivity (e.g., tension headaches, agoraphobia, and substance use problems)

Although stress is part of the human experience, the severity of a given stress does not usually predict the kind and degree of the subsequent reaction.

STRESS VERSUS ANXIETY VERSUS TRAUMA

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ANXIETY

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Anxiety: An unrealistic fear that manifests in physiological arousal and behaviors to avoid or escape the anxiety-provoking stimulus

Neutral stimuli are perceived as stressful, and the defenses fail to identify safety zones and nonthreatening situations and people.

TRAUMA

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Posttraumatic stress disorder: A condition that develops in people who have experienced or witnessed an extreme psychological or physical event that is interpreted as distressing

Those suffering from PTSD unconsciously modify the memories of stressful events up to years afterward.

In PTSD, normal psychophysiological reactions to acute and chronic stress are modified after trauma.

Repeated activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) pathways can cause sensitization and exaggerated responses to even mild stressors.

Memory for traumatic events is very vivid, and the most difficult life experiences are recalled in great detail.

The dissociative response numbs the pain experience temporarily, but symptoms frequently evolve into somatic complaints (e.g., chronic headaches, back pain, or gastrointestinal distress).

The derealization creates an internal world in which the abused feels safer.

STRESS THEORIES: WHAT CAUSES STRESS?

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GENERAL ADAPTATION SYNDROME

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Alarm reaction phase: The body shows the changes characteristic of the first exposure to a stressor (e.g., being at a party but having social anxiety).

Resistance phase: Resistance ensues if continued exposure to the stressor is compatible with adaptation. The bodily signs that appeared in the first stage have virtually disappeared, and resistance rises above normal (e.g., when others try to involve the socially anxious guest, they experience stress).

Exhaustion phase: Eventually, adaptation energy is exhausted. The signs of the alarm reaction reappear, but now they are irreversible (e.g., if the social anxiety is experienced often and over a long period of time, it can result in illness and disease).

EUSTRESS-DISTRESS MODEL

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Examples of eustress:

Stress that produces personal growth

Stress that leads to actions that are beneficial to a prson

Stress that encourages optimum performance

SKILL LEVEL

If people are not practiced enough to do a task, they’ll be under serious pressure, and they won’t perform well.

People are less able to think in a flexible, methodical way when they’re under pressure, which is why they need to be able to fall back on well-rehearsed responses.

PERSONALITY

Personality: Individual differences in characteristic patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving

Extroverts are likely to perform better in high-pressure situations, whereas introverted personalities may perform better with less pressure.

TRAIT ANXIETY

Trait anxiety: A general level of stress that is characteristic of an individual

Trait anxiety varies according to how individuals have conditioned themselves to respond to and manage the stress.

TASK COMPLEXITY

Task complexity: Describes the level of attention and effort that people have to put into a task in order to complete it successfully

Complex activities are better performed in a calm, low-pressure environment.

LIFE-EVENTS THEORY

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The more stressful life events a person experiences, the greater their stress is.

Everyday hassles are even more detrimental to one’s health than major life changes.

Hassles: Daily interactions with the environment that are essentially negative

Uplifts: Positive events that make us feel good

Although the absence of uplifts has not been found to be related to ill health, the presence of hassles has.

Allostasis: Related to homeostasis; the adaptive maintenance of vitality in the autonomic nervous system (sympathetic and parasympathetic divisions) and the cardiovascular and immune systems

Allostatic load: The cumulative biological wear and tear that results from responses to stress that seek to maintain body equilibrium

HARDINESS THEORY

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3 factors of hardiness:

Commitment: The tendency to involve oneself in whatever one is doing

Control: The tendency to believe that and act as if one can influence the course of events

Challenge: The related expectations that it is normal for life to change and that changes will stimulate personal growth

SOCIAL SUPPORT THEORY

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COGNITIVE APPRAISAL MODEL

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Cognitive appraisal: Interpretation of a stressor

Primary appraisal: Involves judging how much of a threat is involved and how important the outcome is

Secondary appraisal: Determining whether resources that are needed to meet the demand are available

Once attempts are made to respond to the threat or to meet the demand, reappraisal occurs.

Reappraisal: Evaluation of whether the response made to a demand/threat was effective

5-step model of stress:

New or potentially unpleasant situation

Cognitive appraisal (i.e., you interpret the situation as threatening)

Emotional arousal

Physiological arousal

Consequences

FUNCTION AND IMPACT OF STRESS

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Stress offers organism a positive coping strategy, enabling the organism a greater chance of survival.

Stress is often a motivator for peak performance.

Yerkes-Dodson curve: Inverted U-shaped curve depicting that there is an optimal level of stress (moderate stress) that results in maximum performance

Illness may result from too little stress, just as it might from too much stress.

The more significant the changes in one’s life, the greater the chance of the onset of illness.

Hot reactors: People who react to stress with an all-out physiological reaction that takes a toll on their health (e.g., dramatic increases in blood pressure)

INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES IN EXPERIENCING STRESS

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Males tend to exhibit more of a fight-or-flight response to stress.

In males, testosterone levels increase significantly with acute stress, which is associated with greater hostility.

Females produce more oxytocin and estrogen to stress, which mediate the effects of cortisol and epinephrine—resulting in nurturing and relaxing emotions.

Tend-and-befriend orientation: Posits that females are more likely to use social connections to cope with stressful events than are males

Women report higher levels of stress than do men.

More men believe they are doing enough to manage their stress than do women, which may be a form of self-deception because more men are likely to develop stress-related chronic illnesses.

Females tend to experience stressors emotionally.

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