Social Psychology and Health Flashcards
- Contrast the biomedical and biopsychosocial models of health & disease.
- The biomedical model:
Rooted in the idea that mind and body are distinct, separable
entities (mind-body dualism)
Medicine looks to bodily factors, rather than the mind, for explanations of health and disease - The biopsychosocial model: A model of health that considers the effects of biological, psychological, and social factors on health and
illness
- Explain why zebras don’t get ulcers (and other stress-related diseases) while we do
a. Define rumination and explain why it can be a problem.
?? Why zebras? See textbook?
a. Rumination: our highly developed prefrontal cortex allows us to anticipate and dwell on potential and past experiences, prolonging our stress. A lot of stress-related disease can be attributed to the fact we frequently
activate physiological systems designed for acute emergencies, keeping them turned on for months or years at a time worrying about grades, relationships, money, etc.
- Explain how Hans Selye’s work contributed to understanding of stress.
- Was studying a newly discovered ovarian hormone
- Rats injected with hormone
developed peptic ulcers, greatly enlarged adrenal glands, shrunken immune tissues - Added a control group—and observed the exact same
effects! - Postulated that the body mounts a similar set of
responses (general adaptation syndrome;
what we now call stress) to a broad array of stressors - Stress is “the nonspecific response of the body
to any demand” (Selye, 1976) - These responses mobilize the organism for action; but if stressors go on for too long, they can make you sick
- Describe the neural and physiological pathways underlying the stress response
a. Identify the neural regions (discussed in class) that serve as a neural alarm
system and project (send their signals) to the hypothalamus
b. Describe the role the hypothalamus plays in the stress response
c. Outline the sympathetic nervous system pathway and how it enables
organisms to deal with stressors
d. Describe the role of the parasympathetic nervous system
e. Outline the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis pathway and how it
enables organisms to deal with stressors
a.
* Hypothalamus Receives input from a set of regions that
serve as a ‘neural alarm system’
* Some we have already talked about—
dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), anterior insula (AI)
* Also the amygdala
b. Hypothalamus: Plays a key role in coordinating motivated behaviours required for survival, including the fight-or-flight response
c. Sympathetic Nervous System
A physiological system that governs the body’s immediate response to a stressful event, enabling the ability to fight or flee
* The hypothalamus initiates sympathetic
nervous system arousal
* Stimulates a part of of the adrenal glands, which secrete chemical messengers including epinephrine
* Leads to increased blood pressure, heart
rate, sweating
d. Parasympathetic Nervous System
* The “brake pedal”
* Acts antagonistically to the sympathetic
nervous system
* Once the emergency has passed,
restores the body to a normal state,
allowing resources to be devoted to lifesustaining processes such as digestion
and growth
e. Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal (HPA) Axis
Hypothalamus initiates a chemical cascade
that stimulates pituitary gland (the “master”
gland)
* Hormone released by the pituitary stimulate
a different part of the adrenal glands, which
in turn releases hormones including cortisol
* Cortisol mobilizes sugar for fuel, increases
heart rate & blood pressure, directs attention
toward threat, contributes to formation of
“flashbulb memories”
(See image!)
- Outline the effects of chronic/prolonged stress on the cardiovascular and immune systems
- The body has built-in negative feedback mechanisms to regulate the
stress response - Cortisol acts on the hypothalamus, turning down that chemical
cascade and helping the body return to a normal state following stress - But repeated, prolonged activation of the HPA axis can compromise its functioning
- Chronic stress can also impair PNS activation, leaving the SNS
unchecked (Porges, 1995)
Cardiovascular system:
* Chronic activation of the sympathetic system & HPA axis can lead to the buildup of plaque on arterial walls, which increases risk of a heart attack
Immune system
* Prolonged experiences of stress compromise the immune system
* When participants were exposed to a cold
virus, those reported experiencing chronic
stressors were more likely to develop a cold in response to the virus (Cohen et al., 1998)
* Stress can slow down wound healing
* Students’ wounds take longer to heal during exam period (vs. summer
vacation) (Marucha et al., 1998)
* While cortisol normally inhibits inflammation, prolonged stress can
result in increased glucocorticoid resistance of immune cells, leading
to heightened inflammation
* Immune cells become incapable of “listening” to cortisol
* Prolonged elevation of the inflammatory response implicated in a large
number of diseases, including depression, cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular disease
- Describe the two factors that have been identified as the key ingredients of events
that people find stressful
a. Describe the Trier Social Stress Test and explain how it utilizes these two
ingredients
2 factors:
* Uncontrollability
In TSST: lack of social feedback, surprise math task
* Social-evaluative threat (possibility that the self could be negatively
judged by others)
Tasks with a social evaluative component associated with an effect size 3X as large as effect size for tasks without such a component
a. Trier Social Stress Test
* Lab paradigm for inducing physiological and psychological stress
* Consists of interview speech given
in front of panel of judges (social-evaluative threat),
followed by surprise mental math (uncontrollability)
task
* Judges remain impassive,
withhold feedback (uncontrollability)
- Describe stress appraisal theory
a. Describe and distinguish between primary and secondary stress
appraisals
b. Identify situations where perceived stress is likely to be high
Stress appraisal theory: (Lazarus & Folkman, 1984): Appraisals of an event and our role in it shape our emotional experience of the event, and our physiological reactions to it
* This theory postulates that stress is what happens when the demands of the situation exceed our ability to cope
a. Primary appraisal: A person’s perception of the demands or challenges
of a given situation
* Is the event positive, negative, or neutral?
* If negative, to what extent is it harmful, threatening for the future, or challenging?
vs.
Secondary appraisal: A person’s perception of his or her ability to deal with the demands of a given situation
* Are coping abilities and resources sufficient to deal with and overcome the harm, threat, or challenge posed by the event?
b. Perceived stress is high when the primary
appraisal of the situation’s demands exceeds
the secondary appraisal of your ability to meet
those demands.
* E.g., High harm/threat + low coping =
substantial stress
- Describe the role that cognition and positive illusions play in in responses to stressful events
a. Describe the effects of the illusion of control and optimism
Cognition—the way we think about a situation—plays a major role in triggering,
amplifying, and reducing stress responses
* Psychologist Shelley Taylor conducted extensive work looking at coping strategies
in people undergoing significant hardship/trauma (e.g., cancer patients)
* Identified a set of positive illusions that promote coping
* Two of these are exaggerated perceptions of personal control and
unrealistic optimism
a. Perceived Control
* Illusion of control (exaggerated perceptions of personal control): A feeling that we have more control over outcomes than is objectively justified
* People who feel less control over stressful events are at a greater risk for depression
* Recall Seligman’s work on learned helplessness
* Perceptions of control positively associated with more adaptive patterns of physiological responses to stressors
more favourable outcomes in cancer patients (Taylor et al., 1984), and longevity in nursing home patients
* Sense of control over stressor can change appraisal from threat to
challenge
* Mere sense of having control can attenuate the impact of the stressor
* Can also foster problem-focused coping—active attempts to modify or
eliminate the stressor
* In some cases, may be able to remove the source of the stress
Optimism:
Dispositional optimism is characterized by generalized positive expectations for the future
Individuals with an optimistic disposition:
* Less cortisol reactivity to stressors
* Less likely to develop cold symptoms after exposure to cold virus
* Show better recovery post surgery and cancer treatment
* Optimism training intervention in patients with heart disease =
improvements in cardiac health
* Like illusion of control, fosters persistence, motivation, & performance
* Improves social functioning
- Distinguish between physical/objective social isolation and subjective sense of social isolation/loneliness
a. Explain how they relate to health
- Physical/objective social isolation and subjective sense of loneliness
are related, but dissociable, concepts - E.g., can be surrounded by family & friends but feel completely alone
- Feelings of social isolation more strongly related to quality of social relationships, rather than frequency of contact
- Subjective feelings of loneliness at least as strong, and potentially even stronger, predictor of health outcomes as objective isolation
a.
* Loneliness is strongly associated with heightened risk of morbidity and
mortality
- Explain why loneliness may be related to negative health outcomes
Evolutionary perspective: safer in a group, more vulnerable when alone
* Consequently, when alone, enter ”self-preservation mode” :
* Hypervigilance for social threat, anxiety, hostility
* Increased sleep fragmentation
* Heightened HPA axis activity
* Altered immune gene expression & increased inflammation
* Depressive symptomatology
* Unfortunately, the increased hypervigilance for social threat can make
loneliness self-perpetuating (self-fulfilling prophecies, etc.)
- Define social support and explain how it relates to health
Social support: the degree to which people believe they can turn to other people for information, help, advice, or comfort
* Positive social relationships are one of the main health protective factors
People who report having a larger and more supportive social network
have:
o Lower blood pressure
o Lower levels of stress hormones
o Stronger immune systems
o Decreased likelihood to develop depression and other
psychopathologies
o Increased lifespans
Hugs= less susceptible to viral infections
- Describe the role that oxytocin plays in social support/connection and health
- Oxytocin is a complex hormone, with different kinds of effects
(including some negative ones!)—but in this kind of context, it appears to play an anxiolytic function, reducing feelings of anxiety
and inhibiting cortisol
Heinrichs et al. (2003)
* Had participants complete the TSST, with a twist—had best friend provide support during the preparation period
* Social support blunted the stress response
- Describe the role that that the ventromedial prefrontal cortex plays in social support/connection and health
VMPFC responds to the absence (vs.
presence) of threat & ‘safety cues’
* Inhibitory effect on threat-related neural
regions (e.g., amygdala)
* Inhibits SNS and promotes PNS activity
* Inhibits cortisol release
SIGNALS SAFETY
remember spider experiment. when spider further away, vmpfc firing
