The Sociology of Stress

Question 1

Douglas Rushkoff’s new series of stressors

Answer 1

Narrative collapse; Digiphrenia; Overwinding; Fractalnoia

Question 2

Narrative collapse

Answer 2

Too much attention on the present moment prevents people from getting a clear perspective on their lives; love events reduced to myopic tweets & updates

Question 3

Digiphrenia

Answer 3

The tacit permission to be in more than one place at a time with a variety of social media

Question 4

Overwinding

Answer 4

The ability to reduce big-time scales into small ones (as a result, getting less done)

Question 5

Fractalnoia

Answer 5

The anxiety associated with rapid media grazing and jumping to conclusions with incomplete information in the absence of cause and effect perspective

Question 6

Future shock by Alvin Toffler

Answer 6

Describes the stress that accompanies a proliferation of technology, urban sprawl, and a glut of info on the Internet

Question 7

Sociology

Answer 7

The study of human social behavior within families, organization, and institutions; the study of the individual in relationship to society as a whole

Question 8

Technostress

Answer 8

The overwhelming frustrations of sensory bombardment and poor boundaries that result from the plethora of technological gadgets, p. 33

Question 9

Shallow effect

Answer 9

A shallow understanding of complicated issues that is caused by info grazing; jumping from site to site and cherry-picking info compromises one’s ability to concentrate or focus on something long enough to fully understand all its implications.

Question 10

Aspects of Technostress

Answer 10

Information overload; Cyber bullying; Identity theft; Cyber hacking; Bandwidth and cloud issues; Boundaries; Privacy; Ethics; Less family time; Computer dating; WiFi stress; Technology and the generational divide (p. 35)

Question 11

Civility

Answer 11

The practice of good manners and appropriate behavior

Question 12

Environmental disconnect

Answer 12

A state in which people have distanced themselves so much from the natural environment that they cannot fathom the magnitude of their impact on it

Question 13

Nature deficit disorder

Answer 13

A term coined by Richard Louv to describe a now-common behavior (affliction) where people (particularly children) simply don’t get outside enough, hence losing touch with the natural world and all of its wonder.

Question 14

Effects of global warming

Answer 14

violent storms, hotter summers, intense droughts, severe weather patterns, dependence on oil, water shortages

Question 15

Causes of water shortages

Answer 15

weather, fracking, rapid population growth, increased energy demands, farming irrigation demands, depleted aquifers, limited water supplies

Question 16

What is the “sixth mass extinction”?

Answer 16

Loss of biodiversity in our modern era

Question 17

Occupational stress

Answer 17

job-related stress, which often comes from occupation duties for which people perceive themselves as having a great deal of responsibility, yet little or no authority or decision-making latitude

Question 18

Lipton’s model of holism

Answer 18

where all parts are respected and come together for a greater purpose

Question 19

Reasons for “job-stress”

Answer 19

low pay, unreasonable workloads, annoying co-workers, poor work-life balance, fear of being laid off (p. 41)

Question 20

Signs of job-stress

Answer 20

burnout, absenteeism, presenteeism (p. 40)

Question 21

Definition of stress

Answer 21

The experience of a perceived threat to one’s mental, physical, or spiritual well-being, resulting from a series of physiological responses and adaptations

Question 22

Superstress, or “future shock”

Answer 22

The inability to cope with an overwhelming amount of change

Question 23

Results of social stress

Answer 23

Decline in social etiquette, a lack of civility, environmental disconnect

Question 24

Concept of sociology of stress

Answer 24

“social networking” or the stress that results due to our inability to keep up with all the changes that influence the many social aspects of our lives

Question 25

Ways society can alleviated race and gender stress

Answer 25

Anti-bullying programs; TV programming using various ethnicities to “better reflect the demographics of American society”; rise above bias and prejudice and take the high road

Question 26

New social stressors

Answer 26

rapid acceleration of technology (software upgrades to Internet downloads), use of & addiction to World Wide Web & its social media outlets, proliferation of smartphones and WiFi devices, an accessible 24/7 society, global economic woes, global terrorism, carbon footprints, public health issues; eroded personal boundaries