Chapter 11: Health and Wellbeing Flashcards
What is subjective well-being?
-individuals’ overall evaluation of life satisfaction and happiness
Define positive psychology
-movement within psychology that applies research to understand how to experience fulfilling lives
What three domains are in the biopsychosocial approach to understanding health? What do they altogether make up? (2)
-Biological, social context and psychological
-health
What are the three lines of inquiry in positive psychology?
-positive subjective experience
-positive individual traits
-positive institutions
What are positive subjective experiences?
-positive moods, positive emotions, flow mindfulness
What are positive individual traits?
-hope, resilience, grit, gratitude
What are positive institutions?
-positive workplaces, positive schools
What do they define happiness as?
-wide range of positive inner feelings
When will survivors of serious illnesses, accidents, natural disasters and other traumatic events report positive psychological growth? (2)
-have successfully coped with trauma, adequate social support
-frequently reflect on the traumatizing event and relate it to some positive outcomes
What are the six domains of post-traumatic growth? (6)
-new possibilities
-relating to others
-personal strength
-appreciation of life
-spiritual change
-life priority change
What is the thought that goes with the domain of post-traumatic growth: new possibilities?
-I have new things that I like to do
What is the thought that goes with the domain of post-traumatic growth: relating to others?
-I feel closer to other people than I did before
What is the thought that goes with the domain of post-traumatic growth: personal strength?
-I learned I can count on myself
What is the thought that goes with the domain of post-traumatic growth: appreciation of life?
-I learned that life is important
What is the thought that goes with the domain of post-traumatic growth: spiritual change?
-I understand religious ideas (or the meaning of life) more
What is the thought that goes with the domain of post-traumatic growth: life priority change?
-I know what really matters in life
What is the definition of stress? When is stress felt?
-lack of fit between perceived demands and perceived ability to cope with demands
-stress is felt when perceived resources<perceived demands
Since stress depends on how we appraise events, what is the primary and secondary appraisal? (2)
Primary: initial evaluation of relevance, level of threat and degree of stress the event brings
Secondary: evaluation of our ability to cope
What is ambient stress? What is an example? (2)
-chronic negative conditions embedded in the environment
-poverty, excessive traffic.
What is an acute stressor?
-threatening event that has a relatively short duration and a clear endpoint
What is a chronic stressor?
-threatening events that have a relatively long duration and no time limit
What are the six types of stress?
-acute stressors
-chronic stressors
-ambient stress
-daily hassles
-readjustment to life changes
-burnout
What are life changes? Can both positive and negative life changes be stressful? What scale rates this? (3)
-any noticeable alteration in one’s living circumstances that require readjustment
-yes both can be stressful
-social readjustment rating scale (SRRS)
What is pressure? What are the two basic types of pressure? (2)
-involves expectations to behave in a certain way
-pressure to perform, and pressure to conform to expectations
What three levels do stress responses occur at? (3)
-emotional
-physiological
-behavioral
What would be an emotional response to a stressful event?
-feeling emotions like anger, fear etc
What would be a physiological response to a stressful event?
-autonomic arousal, hormonal fluctuations
What would be a behavioural response to a stressful event?
-coping efforts, lashing out, blaming oneself, seeking help etc
Define emotions
-powerful, largely uncontrollable feelings, accompanied by physiological changes
What does the inverted -U hypothesis predict about complexity of tasks and the level of arousal that is best? (3)
-low complexity tasks, high level arousal is best
-medium complexity tasks, medium level of arousal is best
-high complexity tasks, low level or arousal is best
What is hardiness?
-disposition marked by commitment, challenge and control - associated with strong stress resilience
What are the moderating variables influencing stress tolerance? (5)
-social support
-hardiness
-optimism
-sensation seeking
-autonomic reactivity
What did Martin Seligman show with the dog experiment? Explain why. (2)
-learned helplessness
-because the dogs could have prevented the electric shock by stopping over the barrier but they learned to just take the shocks and not try to escape
What is the frustration aggression hypothesis?
-when an individual’s goal-directed behavior is blocked (frustration), it leads to an aggressive response (chatgpt)
What does research find happens when you act aggressively?
-it produces more anger and aggression
What is displacement?
-transfer of negative emotion from one person to another
What are the three main categories of constructive coping strategies?
-appraisal-focused
-problem focused
-emotion focused
Describe appraisal-focused coping strategies.
-challenging perspective on the situation or appraisal of it
Describe the problem-focused strategies.
-looking to solve the problem either itself or solving the symptoms
What are emotion-focused strategies?
-releasing pent-up emotions, distracting oneself, actually dealing with the emotions
What is Ellis’s rational-emotive behaviour therapy model?
-therapy that focuses on altering clients’ patterns of irrational/negative thinking to reduce maladaptive emotions and behaviour
How does Ellis’s ABC’s relate to his rational-emotive behaviour therapy? What are Ellis’s ABCs? (4)
-ABC’s are a core component of rational-emotive behaviour therapy
-A is activating event
-B is belief system
-C is consequence
What is the activating event in Ellis’s ABCs?
-any event/situation that triggers a reaction
What is the belief system in Ellis’s ABCs? What can they comprise? (2)
-beliefs about activating event
-irrational appraisal and rational appraisal
What is the consequence in Ellis’s ABCs?
-the emotional and behavioral outcomes resulting from the beliefs
What are two psychosocial modifiers of stress? (2)
-social support
-a sense of personal control
What are the types of social support? (5)
-emotional support
-esteem support
-tangible/instrumental support
-informational support
-network support
What is esteem support? What is esteem support expressed as? (2)
-support that makes someone feel good about themselves
-expressed via positive regard for the person, encouragement or agreement with the individual’s ideas or feelings
What is tangible/instrumental support? Examples? (2)
-direct assistance
-lending money, giving ride somewhere
What is network support?
-feeling of membership in a group of people who share interests and social activities
What are the four types of control people feel that they have our a situation? (4)
-behavioural control
-cognitive control
-decisional control
-informational control
Describe behavioural control. What other type of coping is this the same as? (2)
-ability to take actions to reduce the impact of stressor
-problem-directed coping
Describe cognitive control. What other coping is this the same as? (2)
-the use of thought processes or strategies to modify the impact of the stressor
-appraisal-focused coping
What is decisional control?
-the opportunity to choose between alternative courses of action
What is informational control?
-opportunity to get knowledge about stressful event
What are the four components of emotional intelligence? (4)
-be capable to perceive and express emotion
-use emotions to facilitate thought
-ability to understand and analyze one’s own emotions
-regulate emotion
What are the symptoms of burnout?
-syndrome involving physical and emotional exhaustion, cynicism and a lowered sense of self efficacy that is attributable to work-related stress
j
j
What are strong predictors of happiness?
-personality, work, relationship satisfaction
What are the two ways happiness is measured?
-judgement that life is satisfying
-predominance of positive emotions compared with negative
What is a positive illusion?
-an inflated view of one’s own characteristics as a good, able and desirable person
What do empirical studies consistently find in terms of happiness and sex?
-both women and men are equally happy
What do studies find about age and happiness? There are two types of findings. (2)
-some studies there are very small variations in happiness across age (happiness dips around 20 and begins increasing again after 50)
-in some studies, level of happiness is constant across different age groups
What is the correlation between a nation’s well-being score and its gross national product?
+ 0.67
Is there a relation between income and happiness in the USA in the study?
-both yes and no, depending on whether the individual has made enough money to support the basic needs of life, there is a threshold of income that a person must achieve to be happy and after this it doesn’t effect happiness
Is the overall constant level of happiness affected by sudden fortune or misfortune according to studies? What affects this? (2)
-no it is not affected by fortune or misfortune
-rather by personality
What two personality traits are closely related to well-being?
-extraversion and neuroticism
What is extraversion? Give some examples. (2)
-tendency to seek stimulation and enjoy the company of others
-loves variety and excitement, positive outlook on life, the life of the party
What is neuroticism? Give examples. (2)
-tendency to experience negative emotions more frequently and intensely
-moody, anxious, unstable, pessimistic
What are the four factors acting on peoples happiness the most?
-personality
-life satisfaction (accomplishments and aspirations met)
-social support
-socioeconomic status
What is eustress? What is distress? (2)
-positive stress like getting married
-negative stress
Describe the steps involved in the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. (4)
-hypothalamus activates the sympathetic nervous system which activates the adrenal glands and sends out norepinephrine and epinephrine
-then hypothalamus sends message to pituitary gland
-pituitary gland sends a hormone to the adrenal gland
-adrenal glands secrete cortisol
What does cortisol do when it reaches the hypothalamus?
-triggers a negative feedback loop to turn off HPA axis
What is the alarm stage? What happens to the immune system during this? (2)
-this is fight or flight
-brief reduction in immune response but then it kicks back in
What is the general adaptation system? What are its three stages? (2)
-theory to describe the bodies short-term and long-term reactions to stress
-alarm, resistance and exhaustion
What is the resistance stage? What happens to immunity during this? (2)
-the body prepares for longer defence from the stressor
-immunity increases as body increases its responses
What is the exhaustion stage?
-various physiological and immune systems fail
What is allostatic load? What does it represent? (2)
-cumulative burden of chronic stress and life events on the body’s physiological systems.
-It represents the wear and tear that the body experiences due to repeated cycles of stress and the body’s efforts to adapt to these challenges through the process of allostasis.
Differentiate allostatic load and general adaptation syndrome.
-allostatic load is multiple stress response cycles whereas general adaptation syndrome is just one
What is the tend-and-befriend response?
-respond to stress by nurturing offspring and seeking social support from others
What did Folkman and Moskowitz determine as three strategies that can help people use positive thoughts to deal with stress? (3)
-positive repraisal
-downward comparison
-creation of positive events
According to Kobasa, what three traits describe hardiness? (3)
-commitment
-challenge
-control
What is the broaden-and-build theory?
-positive emotions cause people to expand their view of what is possible in a situation (broaden) and develop new ideas and relationships (build)
