Week 3: Psychological Factors and Stress

Question 1

What are moderators of the stress process

Answer 1

Variables that can change the nature of stress e.g. heighten the stress response.

-Environment/ SES
-Relationships family/ Friends
=contextual factors in stress
-Self = intra-individual factors

Question 2

What are intra- individual factors?

Answer 2

-Psychological differences located “inside the individual”

-These influence the stress process and therefore health.

-Underlies why some people experienced more intense/ sustained reactions to stressors that others (I.e. they have greater “stress reactivity”), which can impair health over time.

Question 3

Appraising stress

Answer 3

-Appraisal = a universal process in which people (and other animals) constantly evaluate the significance of what is happening for their personal well-being

-Stress only occurs when something has been appraised as potentially self threatening.

-Appraisals are fast- yet malleable- and can be influenced by individual differences, context etc.

Question 4

Is appraisal the same as perception?

Answer 4

No perception is pure sensory processing (bottom -up) where as appraisal is an interpretation of the stimulus, and how that stimulus may or may not impact the organism.

Question 5

In what way is appraisal malleable (give an example)

Answer 5

You might appraise something as more stressful when have fewer cognitive resources to deal with it e.g. tired at the end of the day and so view something as more stressful than if you had been presented with it at the start of the day.

Question 6

When you consider the nature of appraisals what is the link between psychology and the stress response?

Answer 6

Because appraisal is an interpretation psychological factors can influence appraisal and in turn influence the stress response.

i.e. individual differences in stress appraisal falls under psychology

Question 7

Primary versus secondary appraisal distinction

Answer 7

-Primary appraisal = fast initial evaluation of whether an event “represents a threat or risk to our wellbeing”

-Secondary appraisal = fast secondary evaluation of whether we have the coping resources necessary to meet the demands placed on us.

Question 8

Stress reactivity

Answer 8

Psychological and biological changes that occur in response to stressors

Question 9

Heightened stress reactivity

Answer 9

An exaggerated, severe, or prolonged stress response.

i.e. how intense is the response + how long does it take to return to baseline?

Question 10

Individual level factors that heighten stress reactivity from the Kiecolt- Glaser reading

Answer 10

-Depression
-Worry and rumination
-Early life adversity
-Evaluation (some debate as to whether dyadic or individual)

Question 11

Dyadic level factors that heighten stress reactivity from the Kiecolt- Glaser reading

Answer 11

-Couples/ relationship partners
-Relationship quality

Question 12

What emotional styles can influence stress apprasial?

Answer 12

-Hostile emotional style -= “heightening factor”

-Negative emotional style (i.e. anxiety, depression, rumination) = Heightening factor

-Positive emotional style = dampening factor

(all of these are intra-individual factors)

Question 13

Hostility

Answer 13

A psychological trait characterized by:

• Patterns of emotions (angry outbursts)

-Cognitions (cynicism, mistrust, and denigrating attitudes towards others)

• Behaviours (aggressive acts, verbal or physical)

Question 14

Angry monkey study

Answer 14

• 26 monkey all housed in instable conditions (i.e. no random assignment to different groups)
• Aim was to measure individual differences in hostility: How does each monkey respond towards the experiment under stress-period procedure? (monkey glove)
• Individual differences in behaviour shown via observational behavioural coding. High reactors acted aggressive, low reactors were calm.
• Physiological = High reactors had greatest increase to heart rate and stayed active for longer period compared to low reacting monkeys.
• Reactivity was related to thicker coronary arteries (intimal thickness) i.e. high reactors had the most atherosclerosis and although not experimental suggests that these monkeys are at greater risk of coronary heart disease.

Note: high reactivity = correlate of hostility

Question 15

Hostility as a significant coronary heart disease risk factor (in humans)

Answer 15

• A 2009 meta analysis showed overall a 20% increase risk for coronary heart disease and worse outcomes for people with greater hostility.
• Gender differences = Greater for men (predisposed to be aggressive)
• Note = heterogeneity (variation) across studies

Question 16

Potential mechanism by which hostility causes increase risk for coronary heart disease …

Answer 16

Greater sympathetic activity (SAM) —> greater hypertension (elevated blood pressure) —> atherosclerosis —-> coronary heart disease

Question 17

Type A personality

Answer 17

• Type A personality = Ambitious, time focused, greater tendency for hostility
• Links to Sapolsky chapter 15: human research on type A personality among cardiovascular patients. Found upholstery wear- and-tear patterns suggesting higher physiological activation (i.e. on edge of seats, fidgeting etc.)
• Hostility was the key correlate of type A behaviour that predicts heart issues i.e. the emotional factor which points to hostility being more important for cardiovascular outcomes then Type A personality in itself.

Question 18

Video: Angry at heart

Answer 18

• Dominant monkeys most stressed compared to subordinate monkeys.
• Dominance = aggression = stress.
• Dominant monkeys exhibit cardiovascular changes which is damaging when combined with high fat diet (artery clogging deposits build up).
• Aggressiveness, mistrust and anger = hostile personality
  When highly hostile people get angry their fight/flight response is stronger —> more physiological arousal to stress (greater SAM activation) and this lasts longer —-> spending too long in this state is damaging for health.

Question 19

Negative emotional styles: Anxiety disorder

Answer 19

– Persistent and excessive worry / fear / rumination about everyday situations that interferes with
daily living.

• Anxiety disorders are associated with too much
  sympathetic nervous system activity (SAM system), due to stronger activation and neural connections of the
  amygdala which
  heighten perceptions of threat; over time, this overactivation causes stress-related cardiovascular illnesses.

Question 20

Negative emotional styles: Neuroticism

Answer 20

• Is one of the Big Five Personality traits that
  reflects normal variation in anxiety-related experiences.

-Too much neuroticism tips into an anxiety disorder

Question 21

What are the big five personality traits? Which is most linked to stress?

Answer 21

Big five =
-Openness
-Conscientiousness
-Extroversion
-Agreeableness
-Neuroticism

Neuroticism is most related to the stress response i.e. to greater stress reactivity.

Question 22

Neuroticism heart attack link

Answer 22

-Higher neuroticism
predicted increased
likelihood of heart
attack death in a
pooled analysis of
three longitudinal
studies (Jokela et al.,
2014).

-Interestingly conscientiousness predicted lower heart attack risk (due to engaging in better health behaviours?)

Question 23

Negative emotional styles: Depression

Answer 23

persistent low mood and
loss of pleasure in daily activities.

Question 24

Reciprocal relationship between depression and stress reactivity

Answer 24

• Stress influencing depression: Extended and prolonged stress can lead to a depressive episode, reflecting a state of
  giving up or “vital exhaustion”; the shift from anxiety to depression reflects a shift from SAM activation to increased
  HPA-axis activation (greater glucocorticoids, like cortisol); over
  time, can lead to poorer health, heart disease, & stroke. Can cause loss of hippocampal volume, which reduces ability to
  learn new information.

-Depression influencing stress: Experiencing a depressive episode can leave a person more vulnerable to experiencing
greater stress reactivity in the future, which can predispose to relapse (“scar hypothesis”) may be due to greater HPA activation and inflammation in response to stress.
(early life adversary is an example of the scars hypothesis).

Question 25

Evolutionary reason for the scars hypothesis

Answer 25

Evolutionary adaptive to be on guard in future if experienced bad things in the past e.g. children exposed to early life abuse highly reactive to negative facial expressions from other adults.

Question 26

Early life exposure link to negative emotional styles

Answer 26

Experiencing early life adversity can leave a person more vulnerable to experiencing greater stress
reactivity in the future; stress systems become more sensitive
(ostensibly to enhance survival); mediated by heighted SAM system activity, HPA-system activity, and inflammation

Question 27

4- minute Ted- Ed video

Answer 27

• Stress not always bad = focus/ boost of energy
• Chronic stress however effects brain size, structure, function, genes
• HPA axis responds to stressful situation —> high levels of cortisol (problematic)
• Hippocampus shrinking, fewer new brain cells (link to depression + Alzheimer’s)

-Exercise and mediation (just two examples) key for decreasing stress and increasing hippocampus size (improving memory).

Question 28

Positive emotional style

Answer 28

• The tendency to experience positive emotional states like
  ‘happy’ ‘relaxed’ ‘joyful’, etc. Also called positive affect (can be varied activation states i.e. low, medium, high).

-Positive affect can “undo” stress by reducing cardiovascular response and speeding recovery; called the “undoing
hypothesis”

Question 29

Fredrickson, Mancuso, Branigan & Tugade
(2000). The undoing effect of positive emotions

Answer 29

• 170 students were put under a stressor (“anxiety induction” speech preparation task) while having blood pressure
  continuously measured.
• Then, watched a film clip of either ocean waves (to elicit contentment), puppies (amusement), boy crying (sadness), or an abstract pattern (neutral).

-Research question: Would people recover from stress more quickly in the content or amusement conditions, compared to the sadness or neutral conditions?

• Continuously recorded heart rate, blood pressure, and other objective measures of cardiovascular activity

results =
- Positive emotional conditions (amusement + contentment) were associated with faster cardiovascular recovery time

Question 30

Link between positive affect, cardiovascular recovery and longevity

Answer 30

-Positive affect is linked to
lower likelihood of cardiovascular disease and possibly greater longevity…

-Carstensen et al (2011) =
more positive emotion’s in life at each time period they were assessed meant they were more likely to survive.

Question 31

Positive affect and parasympathetic control link

Answer 31

• Review by Julia K. Boehm
  & Laura Kubzansky
  (2012) on well-being and
  cardiovascular health
• Protective aspects of wellbeing (feelings of mastery, control, autonomy, optimism & life satisfaction, and positive
  affect).
• Why? Improved health behaviours and greater parasympathetic control.