FREE ESSAY ON STRESS

STRESS

Stress by Ashley Strawder I. What Is Stress? Stress is the combination of psychological,
physiological, and behavioral reactions that people have in response to events that
threaten or challenge them. Stress can be good or bad. Sometimes, stress is helpful,
providing people with the extra energy or alertness they need. Stress could give a runner
the edge he or she needs to persevere in a marathon, for example. This good kind of
stress is called eustress. Unfortunately, stress is often not helpful and can even be
harmful when not managed effectively. Stress could make a salesperson buckle under the
pressure while trying to make a sales pitch at an important business meeting, for
example. Moreover, stress can increase the risk of developing health problems, such as
cardiovascular disease and anxiety disorders. This bad kind of stress is called distress,
the kind of stress that people usually are referring to when they use the word stress. A
convenient way to think about stress is in terms of stressors and stress responses.
Stressors are events that threaten or challenge people. They are the sources of stress,
such as having to make decisions, getting married, and natural disasters. Stress
responses are psychological, physiological, and behavioral reactions to stressors.
Anxiety, depression, concentration difficulties, and muscle tension are all examples of
stress responses. The connection between stressors and stress responses, however, is not
as straight forward as it may seem. Mediating processes, for instance, stand in between
stressors and stress responses. Whether stressors lead to stress responses depends on
mediating processes like how people appraise potential stressors and how well people are
able to cope with the negative impact of stressors. Furthermore, a number of moderating
factors, such as personality traits and health habits, influence the the links between
stressors and stress responses. These mediating processes and moderating factors help
determine whether people experience stress-related problems like burnout, mental
disorders, and physical illness and are the focus of many stress management techniques
that emphasize cognitive-behavioral approaches, relaxation, exercise, diet and nutrition,
and medication. II. Sources of Stress Stressors, the sources of stress, include three
types of events, referred to as daily hassles, major life events, and catastrophes.
Additionally, specific types of stressors occur within certain domains in life, such as
family, work, and school. A. Stressors Daily hassles are the little hassles or annoyances
that occur practically everyday, such as having to make decisions, arguing with friends
and family, trying to meet deadlines at school or work, and stepping on a piece of bubble
gum that someone carelessly spitted out. Although a wide variety of daily hassles can be
sources of stress, they often involve conflicts between behaviors people may or may not
want to do. If someone is experiencing an approach-approach conflict, that person has to
choose between two attractive alternatives, such as going on vacation or buying a new
computer. If someone is experiencing an avoidance-avoidance conflict, that person has to
choose between two unattractive alternatives, such as having a pet put to sleep or
spending the money on an expensive surgical procedure for it. If someone is experiencing
an approach-avoidance conflict, that person has to choose whether to engage in an
activity that has both attractive and unattractive qualities, such as mowing the lawn, an
activity that would result in a nice lawn but would not be enjoyable to do. In general,
major life events do not appear to be significant sources of stress. Accordingly, major
life events generally do not tend to be related to the health problems that accompany
stress. Under some circumstances, however, major life events can be sources of stress.
Whether major life events involve positive or negative feelings, for instance, is
relevant. Major life events that are positive tend to have either trivially stressful or
actually beneficial effects, but major life events that are negative can be stressful and
are associated with medical problems. Examples of major life events are getting married,
getting divorced, and being fired from a job. Although they do not happen very often,
when catastrophes do occur, they can be tremendous sources of stress. One major type of
catastrophe is natural disasters. After people are exposed to natural disasters, they are
more anxious, have more bodily complaints, drink more alcohol, and have more phobias. A
group of Stanford University students who completed a survey before and after the 1989
San Francisco earthquake, for example, were more stressed afterwards than they were
before hand. War is another type of catastrophe. It is one of the most stressful
catastrophes that you could ever endure. Between 16% and 19% of the veterans who served
during Operation Desert Storm, for example, had symptoms of post-traumatic stress
disorder (PTSD), such as recurrent memories, nightmares, restricted emotions, sleep
disturbances, and irritability. PTSD is a mental disorder characterized by the
re-experiencing of stress responses associated with an earlier traumatic event like
withstanding a natural disaster or being assaulted. Compared to the impact of other types
of events, the cumulative effect of daily hassles over time are probably the most
significant sources of stress. An obvious reason why major life events and catastrophes
are probably less significant sources of stress is that people just do not experience
them as often. It is not every day that a person spends time in prison or retires from a
job, for instance. Likewise, people do not have to and possibly never will face the
repercussions of a nuclear war, for instance, on a daily basis. B. Life Domains 1. Family
Specific types of stressors that family members are exposed to through their family
include a lack of parent-child emotional bonding, parental workload, misbehavior of
children, teenage pregnancy, lack of emotional closeness between spouses, poor
communication between spouses, tension between spouses, divorce, remarriage, and maternal
depression. Additionally, a family member's job can interfere with his or her home life.
Marital conflict is a good example of a daily hassle that is specifically related to the
family. Marital conflict tends to occur when spouses come from different social and
economic backgrounds and the spouse of higher status emphasizes his or her superiority.
Marital conflict often occurs in the context of unequal occupational statuses, for
instance. Teenage pregnancy, particularly the unplanned pregnancy of an unmarried,
teenage daughter, is a good example of a major life crisis that is specifically related
to the family. Regarding teenagers who follow through with the pregnancy, this event
leads to several premature role transitions, such as the teenager becoming a young mother
and the mother becoming a young grandmother. These kinds of role transitions tend to be
sources of distress in the family if new mothers are still teenagers but sources of
eustress if new mothers are age 20 or older. In cases in which teenagers terminate the
pregnancy, they tend to find it especially stressful if they perceive a lack of support
from their parents or the father of the child, are less sure of their decision and coping
abilities beforehand, blame themselves for the pregnancy, or delay until the second
trimester. 2. Work The specific types of stressors that employees are exposed to in the
workplace fall into four categories of demands: task demands, interpersonal demands, role
demands, and physical demands. Among these categories, work overload, boundary extension,
role ambiguity, role conflict, and career development are particularly relevant
stressors. Additionally, an employee's home-life can interfere with his or her job. Work
overload is a good example of a daily hassle that is particularly relevant in the
workplace. When employees feel overwhelmed from trying to work on more tasks than they
can handle or from trying to work on tasks that are too difficult for them, they are
suffering from work overload. Work overload is common after layoffs among the remaining
workers who are assigned more tasks. It is also common among newly appointed managers who
feel unprepared for their new, unfamiliar roles. Boundary extension is another good
example of a daily hassle that is particularly relevant in the workplace. Some jobs, such
as public relations and sales, require employees to work with people in other
occupational settings. Such boundary extension can be difficult for employees, especially
if it involves any of the following difficulties: Dealing with very diverse organizations
Maintaining frequent and long-term relations with people in other organizations
Interacting in complex and dynamic environments Not having screening mechanisms like
secretaries or voice mail Participating in non-routine activities Trying to meet
demanding performance standards (139) Two more good examples of daily hassles that are
particularly relevant in the workplace are role ambiguity and role conflict. When
employees are unsure about what is expected of them, how to perform their job, or what
the consequences of their job performance are, they are experiencing role ambiguity. When
employees finds it difficult to perform their job effectively because of the multiple
explanations about their job performance, they are experiencing role conflict. Role
conflict takes place in five basic ways: Receiving conflicting or incompatible
expectations from another employee Receiving different expectations from two or more
other employees Receiving expectations that lead to incompatible roles Receiving too many
expectations, expectations leading to too many roles, or expectations leading to roles
that are too complicated Having values and beliefs that conflict with expectations (139)
Career development is a good example of a major life event specifically related to work.
Changing jobs or occupations can be stressful. People may feel frustrated and afraid, for
example, after being laid off or fired from their job. Similarly, employees may feel
belittled or embarrassed after being demoted. These feeling may be even more damaging for
employees if such changes in ccupational status interfere with their family life. 3.
School As with work, work overload, role ambiguity, and role conflict are daily hassles
that are particularly relevant to students. Students incollege, for instance, often feel
overwhelmed from having too many assignments or assignments that are too
difficult.Additionally, they sometimes experience role ambiguity in poorly designed
courses or from poor instructors and sometimesexperience role conflict from instructors
who seem to believe that the students in their classes are not taking any other
classes.According to two surveys, the following stressors are particularly relevant for
college students: Final grades Excessive homework Term papers Examinations Study for
examinations Time demands Professors Class environment Among children and adolescents,
transitions from one stage of schooling to another are major life events that can be
significantstressors. The transition from elementary school to junior high or middle
school, for instance, can be a significant stressor. III. Stress Responses Although the
presence of stressors does not mean that stress responses will necessarily follow, when
they do, stress responsesare the way in which people react to stressors. They are the
experience of being stressed. Stress responses can be divided into three categories:
psychological responses, physiological responses, and behavioral responses. A.
Psychological Responses When people react to stressors, a wide variety of cognitive and
emotional responses can occur. Examples of cognitiveresponses are as follows:
Concentration problems Indecision Forgetfulness Sensitivity to criticism Self-critical
thoughts Rigid attitudes B. Physiological Responses Physiological responses follow what
is called the general adaptation syndrome. The GAS has three stages:alarm, resistance,
and exhaustion. The first stage, aarm, is basically the fight-or-flight response, the
various physiological changes that prepare the body to attack r to flee a threatening
situation. The sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system is activated and
prompts the release of two catecholamines, epinephrine and norepinephrine, from the
adrenal medulla.Additionally, glucocorticoids like cortisol are releasedfrom the adrenal
cortex. The following examples of physiological changes characterizes the alarm stage:
Increased heart rate Increased blood pressure Rapid or irregular breathing Muscle tension
Dilated pupils Sweating Dry mouth Increased blood sugar levels In the second stage,
resistance, the body tries to calm itself and restrain the fight-or-flight response from
the alarm stage. These changes allow people to deal with stressors more effectively over
a longer period of time. When the body eventually runs out of energy from trying to
resist stressors, the exhaustion stage takes over. In this stage, the body admits defeat
and suffers the negative consequences of the stressors, such as a decreased capacity to
function correctly, less sleep, or even death. C. Behavioral Responses People act
differently when they are reacting to stressors. Sometimes, the behaviors are somewhat
subtle, such as the following responses: Strained facial expressions A shaky voice
Tremors or spasms Jumpiness Accident proneness Difficulty sleeping Overeating or loss of
appetite Behavioral responses are more obvious when people take advantage of the
preparatory physiological responses of the fight-or-flight response. One side of the
fight-or-flight response is that it prepares people to fight, and people sometimes take
advantage of that feature and behave aggressively toward other people. Unfortunately,
this aggression is often direct toward family members. After Hurricane Andrew devastated
south Florida in 1992, for example, reports of domestic violence doubled. The other side
of the fight-or-flight response is that it prepares people for flight . The following
behavioral responses are examples of how people try to escape threatening situations:
Quitting jobs Dropping out of school Abusing alcohol or other drugs Attempting suicide
Committing crimes (23; 116; 129) IV. The Connection Between Stressors and Stress
Responses Stressors prompt stress responses, right? Well, it depends. A number of
conscious and unconscious things occur in our inner world that determine whether a
stressor in the external world will trigger our stress response. These inner world
happenings are referred to as mediating processes and moderating factors. A. Mediating
Processes Mediating processes in our inner mind/body world begin to influence the quality
and intensity of our stress response from the moment we are exposed to a stressor.
Consider, for example, a person who discovers that his or her cat neglected to use the
litter box. Whether or not this person appraises the problem as something he or she can
establish control over may help determine whether he or she becomes angry. Mediating
processes include appraisal and coping. 1. Appraisal Once people become aware of a
stressor, the next step is appraisal. How a stressor is appraised influences the extent
to which stress responses follow it. In fact, many stressors are not inherently
stressful. Stressors can be interpreted as harm or loss, as threats, or as challenges.
When stressors have not already led to harm or loss but have the potential to do so, it
is usually less stressful for people if the stressors are seen positively as challenges
rather than negatively as threats. The influence of appraisal does have its limits,
though. For example, although people who suffer from chronic pain tend to be able to
enjoy more physical activity if they view their pain as a challenge they can overcome,
appraisal does not matter if the pain is severe. Moreover, thinking negatively about the
influence of past stressors is associated with a greater vulnerability to future
stressors. Consider, for example, people with PTSD. Among victims of sexual or physical
assault with PTSD, those who have trouble recovering tend to have more negative
appraisals of their actions during the assault, of others' reactions after the assault,
and of their initial PTSD symptoms. An important aspect of appraisal is how predictable
and controllable a stressor is judged to be. Regarding predictability, not knowing if or
when a stressor will come usually makes it more stressful, especially if it is intense
and of a short duration. After a spouse passes away, for example, the other spouse tends
to feel more disbelief, anxiety, and depression if the death was sudden than if it was
anticipated weeks or months in advance. Similarly, during the Vietnam War, for example,
wives of soldiers who were missing in action felt worse than did wives of soldiers who
were prisoners of war or had been killed. Regarding control, believing that a stressor is
uncontrollable usually makes it more stressful. Alternatively, believing that a stressor
is controllable, even if it really is not, tends to make it less stressful. When people
are exposed to loud noises, for example, they tend to see it as less stressful when they
are able to stop it, even if they do not bother to stop it. How much more stressful a
stressor becomes from feeling a lack of control over it depends, however, on the extent
to which the cause of the stressor is seen as stable or unstable, global or specific, and
internal or external. Stable and unstable causes represent causes that are enduring and
temporary, respectively. Global and specific causes represent causes that are relevant to
many events and relevant to a single occasion, respectively. Internal or external causes
represent causes that are the result of personal characteristics and behaviors or the
result of environmental forces, respectively. The more stable and global the cause of a
stressor seems, the more people feel and behave as though they are helpless. Likewise,
the more internal the cause of a stressor seems, the worse people feel about themselves.
Together, these feelings and behaviors contribute to a depressive reaction to the
stressor. Consider, for example, a case in which a guy's girlfriend breaks up with him
and he thinks that his love life is always in the dumps, that nobody really cares about
him, and that he must not be a dateable guy. Such an interpretation could contribute to a
depressive reaction, such as him coming to the conclusion that he might as well not try
because there is nothing he can do about it and that he is pretty much a lost cause. 2.
Coping After a stressor has been appraised, the next step, if necessary, is coping. How
well people are able to cope with stressors influences the extent to which stress
responses follow them. Coping strategies can be divided into two broad categories:
problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping. Problem-focused coping involves trying
to manage or to alter stressors, and emotion-focused coping involves trying to regulate
the emotional responses to stressors. Although people tend to use both forms of coping in
most cases, the relative use of each of these forms of coping largely depends on the
context. Problem-focused coping is more appropriate for problems in which a constructive
solution can be found, such as family-related or work-related problems. Alternatively,
emotion-focused coping is more appropriate for problems that just have to be accepted,
such as physical health problems. B. Moderating Factors Moderating factors influence the
strength of the stress responses induced by stressors or the direction of the relation
between stressors and stress responses. Regarding the previous example about the cat and
the litter box, how angry the person becomes after finding out that his or her cat
neglected to use the litter box may depend on, for instance, how anxious or tense he or
she is in general. Mediating processes include appraisal and coping. Moderating factors
include personality traits, health habits, coping skills, social support, material
resources, genetics and early family experiences, demographic variables, and preexisting
stressors. 1. Personality Traits Two general personality traits, positive affectivity and
negative affectivity, are particularly relevant to stress. People who are high in
positive affectivity tend to have positive feelings like enthusiasm and energy, feelings
that characterize eustress. People who are high in negative affectivity tend to have
negative feelings like anxiety and depression, feelings that characterize distress. In
particular, negative affectivity is associated with the ineffective use of coping
strategies and susceptibility to daily stressors. Another personality trait relevant to
stress is optimism, a general tendency to expect that things will work out for the best.
Optimism is associated with stress resistance. Students who are optimistic, for example,
tend to have fewer physical responses to stressors at the end of an academic term than do
students who are pessimistic. Even when taking into account other personality traits like
negative affectivity, perceived control, and self-esteem, optimism is still associated
with a lack of stress responses like depression. As stated previously, appraising the
causes of a stressor as stable, global, and internal contributes to a depressive reaction
to the stressor. Such appraisals are usually made by people who have a general tendency
for this kind of appraisal, referred to as a pessimistic explanatory style or a
depressive explanatory style. Such people tend to have more depressive reactions to
stressors in general. Hardiness is composed of a set of three related personality traits:
control, commitment, and challenge. Control refers to the belief in people that they can
influence their internal states and behavior, influence their environment, and bring
about desired outcomes. Commitment refers to the tendency for people to involve
themselves in what they encounter. Challenge refers to the willingness in people to
change and try new activities, which provides opportunities for personal growth.
Hardiness is associated with stress resistance. In particular, hardiness is associated
with favorable appraisals of potential stressors and effective use of coping strategies.
Of the three personality traits that comprise hardiness, control appears to be the most
important. For instance, when people feel unable to control their environment, cortisol
levels rise in the body. This process can take place in response to crowding, for
example, in places like high-density residential neighborhoods, prisons, and college
dormitories. Self-esteem, how people tend to feel about themselves, is another
personality trait that is relevant to stress. Self-esteem is one factor that can
influence the relation between daily hassles and emotional responses to stressors.
Additionally, low self-esteem is associated with increased blood pressure in response to
stressors and other physiological responses that often occur in response to stressors,
such as trembling hands, pounding heart, pressures or pains in the head, sweating hands,
and dizziness. Low self-esteem also has an important role in depression . A. Burnout
Burnout is an increasingly intense pattern of psychological, physiological, and
behavioral dysfunction in response to a continuous flow of stressors or chronic stress.
It is commonly found among employees and professionals who have a high degree of personal
investment in work and high performance expectations. In the initial stages, people often
have a variety of physiological and behavioral symptoms and lose interest and confidence
in their work. The following physiological symptoms may occur: Shortness of breath Loss
of appetite or weight Headache Fatigue and exhaustion The following behavioral symptoms
may occur: Lack of interest in fellow employees Risky behavior Mood swings In the later
stages, people often do the following things: Abuse alcohol and other drugs Smoke
excessively Drink more caffeinated beverages Become more rigid in their thinking Lose
faith in the abilities of co-workers, management, the organization, and themselves Become
less productive (117) Another concept, ego depletion, is very similar to burnout. In
fact, it may represent an underlying feature of burnout. The idea behind ego depletion is
that acts of volition-making choices and decisions, taking responsibility, initiating and
inhibiting behavior, and making plans of action and carrying them out-draw on a limited
supply of volitional energy that is available inside people. Consequently, if people
deplete this resource too much, it is no longer very easy to do what they need to do to
handle stress, such as trying to use coping strategies in response to stressors. B.
Mental Disorders Mental disorders are the result of a varying combination of sources, one
of which being stress. Examples of other sources are as follows: Chemical imbalances
Inherited characteristics Early learning experiences Brain damage Psychological traits
People sometimes have symptoms of mental disorders, but they usually do not meet the
criteria or are not clinically significant, severe enough to necessitate treatment.
Before a person can be diagnosed with a mental disorder, his or her problematic thoughts,
feelings, and actions must meet the criteria for the mental disorder and must prevent
adequate social, occupation, or other forms of functioning. Stress may play a causal role
in a wide variety of mental disorders. Some of the mental disorders in which stress
appears to have a causal role are anxiety disorders, mood disorders, and
substance-related disorders.