Part C - Health and Unhealthy Behaviours Flashcards
What is coping?
Research recognises two major functions of coping:
- regulating stressful emotions
- altering the person-environment relationship causing the distress.
This makes us question: Why do some people fight whereas some people flight? Why do some people approach and some avoid?
How does the developmental perspective describe emotional reactions to stressors?
The key components are:
- temperament
- conditioning (behaviour)
- emotional development
- cognitive development
What is meant by ‘temperament’?
Temperament is generally assumed to be innate but
personality is a collection of:
- behaviours (acquired/learned),
- emotions (shaped through social relationships,
- patterns of thought (product of cognitive development).
Temperament is generally attributed to infants, e.g. easy or flexible, active or feisty, slow to warm or cautious. In adults, ‘temperament’ is normally referred to as or thought of as ‘personality. E.g. the ‘big 5’ personality (Costa & McCrae, 1996):
- intraversion vs extraversion
- neuroticism vs stability
- agreeableness vs disagreeableness
- open to experience vs resistance to change
- consciousness vs laxity
Describe Goodwin and Friedman’s (2006) findings about health status and the Big Five personality traits.
In a National Survey, 3032 adults aged between 25 and 74. Goodwin and Friedman (2006) found that higher consciousness levels related to higher levels of education. Consciousness was lower amongst those with mental health disorders and physical illnesses (except lung problems.
How do children acquire healthy and unhealthy behaviours?
Classical conditioning, operant conditioning and social learning theory explain how children acquire healthy and unhealthy behaviours.
How do we learn coping habits?
How we learn depends on:
- genetics
- style of parenting
- socioeconomic and other environmental factors.
Poor coping strategies are often attributed to unhealthy habits. They have an INDIRECT impact on health.
Socialisation patterns also have physiological implications (Monti et al., 2014). They can have a direct impact on cardiovascular and immune systems).
What us meant by emotional development?
Everyone shares the same basic emotions but we learn to regulate these emotions based on our up bringing. Children differ on their temperament. It is easier to comfort and socialise with some children than others.
Discuss the attachment theory (Bowlby, 1969, 1973).
The theory concerns the understanding of the functions of a close bond with an attachment figure. Initially the theory was concerned with the infant-caregiver bond but later extended to other attachment relationships, especially romantic partners.
Attachment styles in adults: anxious, avoidant and secure.
The attachment styles are shown to predict whether people seek support from others and their ability to provide comfort and reassurance when their partner needs it.
What are the implications of attachment style on patterns of health and illness according to Feeney?
Feeney (2000) found that secure attachment was linked with a wide range of coping strategies.
Insecure attachment was correlated with the seeking of short-term fixes which can create long-term problems.
Avoidant attachment was related with the tendency to suppress or deny problems and emotions.
What did Taylor et al. (2004) find regarding early environment, emotions, responses to stress and health?
Taylor et al., (2004) found that a harsh family environment is associated with risky heath behaviours in adulthood, e.g:
- substance abuse
- risky sexual behaviour
- poor diet
- lack of exercise
- other risk-related behaviours
Harsh family environments refers to lack of nurturance, overt conflict and aggression, neglect, cold/unaffectionate.
What are some of the influences of stress that are ignored?
Socio-economic status. Being of a lower status can be stressful. E.g. if there are money issues causing stress, children may pick this up from their parents. Parents may mistreat children if stressed.
Genetics. Shared genetic inheritance can contribute to negative emotional states.
How does cognitive development describe learning?
Beliefs are constructed through interaction with the world including other people. Genetics may impact on propesity to learn but thought processes are constructed through experience. We learn through self-discovery and shared experiences.
Discuss ‘Project Ice Storm’ and what this tells us about stress.
‘Project Ice Storm’ by King and Laplante (2005) gives us some interesting findings on prenatal experiences of stress.
There was a freezing rain storm in Quebec, Canada that left 3 million people with no power for a few hours however some were left with no power for weeks.
1400 pregnant women were recruited in a longitudinal study.
Their objective reaction to exposure to the ice storm and their subjective stress was measured. The mothers scored on average of 11.9 points. More than 22 points = clinical range for potential PTSD. This affected 16.6% of the mothers.
Lab assessments at 2 years old looking at cognitive development, language development and functional play.
The results showed that when mother’s had moderate-high prenatal maternal stress, the child showed significantly lower cognitive development and less word use and comprehension.
Cognitive assessments of the children at 5.5years showed the effects persisted into middle childhood.
What leads to coping?
- appraisal of the environment
- goal has been threatened, lost or harmed
- appraisal is characterised by negative emotions
- basic emotions such as anger and fear result in quick fixes to the immediate situation
- secondary emotions such as annoyance and anxiety lead to repetitive actions and rumination, e.g. getting stressed
Positive emotions lead to more long-term, appropriate solutions to problems. But, how can you experience positive emotions when you are stressed?
How do we cope?
First, we attempt to reduce negative emotions as they can be stressful and may interfere with effective coping. Emotions are integral to the coping process as an outcome, a response and a result of appraisal.
The Fight or Flight theory talks about quick fixes, whereas Fredrickson’s Broaden and Build Theory talks about long term solutions.
What is emotion regulation?
Attempting to manage the emotional states. Two commonly used methods are:
- cognitive reappraisal
- expressive suppression
Reappraisal involves adapting behaviour to suit a different or other point of view.
Suppression comes late in the response process where behaviour is modified without being reduced.
John and Gross (2004) found that reappraisal was more prevalent to the anticipation of the event whereas expressive suppression was more prevalent in response to an unanticipated event. They tested this by showing people emotionally charged film and found that individuals who used reappraisal in negative situations showed greater positive emotion, lower negative and better psych health. This was the opposite for suppression in a negative situation.
What are the different types of coping strategies?
- Emotion-focused
- Problem-focused
- Avoidant Strategies
- Social support
- Pets as social support
Can food really affect our behaviour?
There are constantly new claims and new “research” coming out saying how food can affect us. E.g. lack of vitamins = cancer, omega 3 = better brain health, earlier this week there were claims saying that eggs are extremely good for you, whereas years ago there were claims they are bad for the heart. We are always being hit with claims but there needs to be more evidence.
What is a macronutrient and what is a micronutrient?
Macronutrient - dietary fat, carbohydrates, protein.
Micronutrient - vitamins and minerals.
What did the Netherlands food famine in 1944-1945 tell us about our relationship with food?
For 6 months there was a food famine affecting a specific part of the Netherlands. On average, less than 1000 calories were consumed daily. A relationship was found between low calories and schizophrenia.
