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Summary Stress
The causes of stress and the issues it can cause to the body and mind
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Chapter 16 – Health psychology: Adjusting to lifeEven after one has been through a lot of trauma, mentally and physically, they are able to put mind
over matter and become successful and stress free – possible due to the biopsychosocial model of
health and illness. All biological, social and psychological aspects of life attribute to overall health
even someone with cancer can feel better mentally through spiritual healing and die in comfort
rather than agony. People with pancreatic surgery lose a lot of weight, but can recover through
mental healing and feeling better about themselves
Stressors: demanding or threatening situations which
lead to stress, something that places a high demand on
us, that can lead to psychological and physiological
health problems
Stress as a stimulus – it helps us identify the problems
that are around us (exams, dentist appointments and
relationships are stressors)
Stress as a response – cortisol releases through the
body and the sympathetic nervous system is activated
Stress as an ongoing interaction between organisms
and the environment – helps us realise what is a threat
anyway; if we see a lion in our environment, it
becomes a stressor, but if it is a squirrel, it is fine
Stress can cause health impairments
Stress makes it so that people cannot fully concentrate on everything, they act irrationally
sometimes and they also feel the impacts in their bodies (fast heart, sweat, tense muscles)
Stress is a pattern of cognitive appraisals, physiological responses and behavioural tendencies that
occur in response to high demands in the environment that someone has insufficient resources to
tackle. Stress is mainly about perception; what someone sees as threatening, another person would
not
Transactional model of stress (Lazarus): Perception of how high demand is and how low resources
are to tackle a problem – subjective depending on the person. But it is so complex to understand,
since it does not apply to everyone
There are different types of stressors in life that can apply to everyone, like natural disasters or
extreme relationship issues, but sometimes people do not respond to stress at all
, INTERNAL PROCESSES
Cognitive
appraisal – Physiological
responses – Coping and
demands
sympathetic task
Intensity (primary), supply
arousal and behaviours
(secondary) and
consequences stress hormones
Duration
Situation
(demands/supp
Predictability ly/stressor) Disorganisa
Worry, racing Muscle tension, tion,
Controllability thoughts. Low elevated heart substance
self-confidence, rate, dyspnoea abuse and
EFFECTS
hopelessness and risk of illness irrelevant
Chronicity responses
Stressors
They can be physical or physiological – a natural hazard or a threat to social security
Some levels of stress can enhance performance and problem solving skills, provided the levels of
demand are not too high
Eustress: optimal level of stress that helps with our performance
Distress is heightened when supply < demand
Micro-stressors – not as intense, but minor, annoying inconveniences – traffic and homework
Major stressors involve death of a loved one or a serious illness
Catastrophic stressors involve terrorist attacks, natural disasters and war
Events occurring over a long period of time, events that are unpredictable and events that someone
lacks control over cause more psychological impairment over time
Measuring stressful life events
Subjective reports of the measures in the chart above and whether the events were major or minor
and positive or negative. A person can rate their own intensity and assess the impact of the stressors
on their own lives
The stress response: A mind and body link
Stress response: responses with cognitive, psychological and behavioural components
Cognitive appraisal: Primary (demands of the situation, is it a threat or not?), secondary (resources
available to cope with it; social resources, physical resources and mental capacity), judgements of
the consequences and personal meaning (how does the outcome link to us?) – will the
consequences cause harm, like low self-esteem of pain? People can over or underestimate stimuli
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