Chapter 11: Stress, Health, and Human Flourishing Flashcards
Health Psychology
Uses behavioral principles to prevent illness and promote health
Lifestyle Diseases
Diseases related to health-damaging personal habits
Behavioral Risk Factors
Behaviors that increase the chances of disease, injury, or premature death
Stress
any circumstance (real or perceived) that threatens a person’s well-being.
Eustress
Good stress (e.g., travel, dating)
Stress Reaction
Physical response to stress
– Autonomic Nervous
System is aroused
Stressor
Condition or event that challenges or threatens the person
Pressure
When a person must meet urgent external demands or expectations
Catastrophic Events
Catastrophic events like earthquakes, combat stress, and floods lead individuals to become depressed, sleepless, and anxious.
Personal stressors
major life events such as personal faliure
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD
a person has experienced a significantly stressful event that has long-lasting effects that may include re-experiencing the event in vivid flashbacks or dreams
Daily Hassles
Rush hour traffic, long lines, job stress, and becoming burnt-out are the most significant sources of stress and can damage health
Burnout
Job-related condition of physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion.
Three aspects of burnout
- Emotional Exhaustion: Feel “used up” and “empty”
- Cynicism or detachment from others
- Feeling of reduced personal accomplishment
Emotional signs
anxiety, apathy, irritability, mental fatigue
Behavioral signs
avoidance of responsibilities and relationships, extreme or self-destructive behavior, self-neglect, poor judgment
Physical signs
frequent illness, exhaustion, overuse of medicines, physical ailments and complaints.
General Adaptation Syndrome
GAS
Phases a stressed individual goes through:
Alarm Reaction, Stage of Resistance, and Stage of Exhaustion
Alarm Reaction
Body resources are mobilized to cope with added stress
Stage of Resistance
Body adjusts to stress but at a high physical cost; resistance to other stressors is lowered
Stage of Exhaustion
Body’s resources are drained and stress hormones are depleted, possibly resulting in:
– Psychosomatic disease – Loss of health – Complete collapse
Social Readjustment Rating Scale (SRRS)
Rates the impact of various life events on the likelihood of contracting illness
• Not a foolproof method of rating stress
Life Change Units (LCU’s)
Numerical values
assigned to each life event on the SRRS
Hassles or microstressors
Distressing daily annoyances
The Holmes and Rahe Stress Scale
• Each event should be considered if it has taken place in the last 12 months. Add values to the right of each item to obtain the total score.
• Your susceptibility to illness and mental health problems:
– Low< 149 – Mild= 150-200 – Moderate= 200-299 – Major>300
Psychoneuroimmunology
study of the links among behavior, stress, disease, and the immune system
Immunity is also lowered
by divorce, bereavement, a troubled marriage, job loss, depression, and similar stresses.
Strengthen immune system response
happiness, laughter, and deligh
Two cardiologists, Meyer Friedman and Ray Rosenman,
classified people as either Type A or Type B
Type A
a term used for competitive, hard-driving, impatient, verbally aggressive, and anger-prone people.
Type B
refers to easygoing, relaxed people
more likely to develop coronary heart disease
Type A personalities
Hardy Personality
Personality type associated with superior stress resistance
• Hold a world view that consists of three traits:
• Sense of personal commitment to self and family
• Feel they have control over their lives • See life as a series of challenges, not threats
