2.01 - Stress Flashcards
What complications/symptoms has chronic stress been associated with?
Anxiety Depression Impaired memory & concentration Sleep problems Fatigue Heart disease Weight gain Substance abuse
What are the three way stress can be defined?
Stimulus Form: defined in terms of particular events in the environment
Response Form: defined in terms of the physiological and psycholofcial
effect on those events
Process form: defined in terms of individual perceptions of those events
What is a definition of stress?
Stress is the condition that results when person/environment transactions lead the individual to perceive a discrepancy between the demands of a situation and the resources of that person’s biological, psychological and social systems.
What are the two ‘appraisals’ the individual undertakes when faced with a potential stressor?
Primary appraisal: determining the meaning (relevant, importance, good/benign/stressful) and implications (harm/loss, threat/challenge) of the situation
Secondary appraisal: occurs at the same time and interacts with primary. Includes: feelings of self-efficacy, probability of success, availability of resources, amount of effort involved.
What are some of the bodily responses to stress and how do they effect health?
Fight or flight response and homeostasis neuroendocrine response results in: redistribution of blood away from nonessential organs, activation of the sympathetic and inhibition of the parasympathetic nervous systems. These lead to an elevation of: heart rate, blood pressure, respiration rate, muscle tension, cortical arousal, clotting factors, polo-motor response (goosebumps)
Describe the two types of specificity of the autonomic response to stress
Stimulus-Response Specificity: Pattern of ANS response is stereotypic and specific to the stimulus (e.g. fear –> same pattern of activation in most people)
Individual-Response Specificity: ANS response idiosyncratic to the person experiencing stress, predominantly in one system (e.g. stressor –> elevated blood pressure –> hypertensive, OR stressor –> muscle tension around joints –> arthritis)
What is General Adaptation Syndrome?
A profile of how organisms respond to stress; the general adaptation syndrome is characterized by three phases.
A what are the three phases of general adaptation syndrome?
An alarm phase where there is a slight reduction in resistance to stress, i.e stress affects you more
A resistance phase. Where his resistance to stress until the stressor is removed (you realise stress isn’t going away so you become more resistant)
An exhaustion phase, which occurs if the individual is exposure for too long and depletes their resources for coping with the stress.
Describe the consequences of the exhaustion phase of general adaptation syndrome
This stage results in health problems in the body.
Decreased stress tolerance (more likely to have extreme stress response to other stressors
Symptoms of disease and dysfunction in the target organ
Increased vulnerability to disease
Psychological exhaustion
Describe the feedback loop in stress and the effect it can have psychologically
If a vulnerable Target-Organ has been affected resulting in disease, this in itself (related signs & symptoms), can have a negative impact on a person’s cognitions and emotions
This can cause further stress, creating a psychophysiologically self-sustaining stress response.
E.g. heart disease, becomes stressed about the symptoms and your overall condition
What are some ways to reduce the impact of stress?
Avoid stressor if possible (and if healthy)
Cognitive strategies (e.g. CBT)
Maintain good health behaviour (regular exercise, eating well, sleeping well, etc.)
Develop effective coping strategies (e.g. time management skills etc.)
Relaxation exercises
Take advantage of support systems (e.g. friends, family, GP, psychologist)
