Stress Flashcards
What is stress
Stress is an important mediator of relationships between health behaviour. It is the most popular concept studied in modern sociological, psychological and psychiatric literature. It has been depicted as a process involving changes in physiological, affective, cognitive and behavioural states. Because of the breadth to which stress covers, a lot of controversies belies giving stress a single definition.
How will you define it in your essay
Seyle who helped to frame the modern stress concept by describing ‘stress’ as an umbrella term, a stressor, stress response and strain
What is the impact on stress in the UK
2015/2016 Labour force survey
About 24 days annually are lost due to stress related illness, and an overall of 37% of work-related illness. HCP and teachers are most likely to be stressed economy nearly £6.5bn each year
Stress as a response
Cannon model - fight or flight- an automated response to dangerous stimuli. It was seen mainly as an adaptive response to manage a stressful event. He also noted that activation of this long term could lead to long term problems
GAS- This was modelled by Seyle in 1956 (like the pattern theory year). This involved three stages, A, R, E where the individual had been exposed to so much stress they were incapable of showing any more resistance
Limitations of the early pain model
Passive. Not active. Stress being done
Does not take into account psychosocial factors
Also does not take into account individual responses so assumes that each individual responds the same way. It does not take into account things like why some people would find sky-diving as exhilarating but others completely hate it
Stress as a stimulus
Life change model
This emphasised physiological changes and aimed to examine the relationship between stress and stress-related changes as a response to the stress experiences. It included a list of all the possible life changes a person could have, and based on a scoring system, it concluded that the higher the score, the increased likelihood of stress i.e. the more stressful life events and the individual has the more likely to be stressed.
Tenant et al 2006 - In patients with MS, those with more stressful life events were more likely to have a relapse
Philips et al 2008- In a 17-year longitudinal study of Scottish men and women age 56, when sex, BMI and other factors were controlled for, the number of health-related life events imposed stress which was strongly predictive of mortality
Limitations of the LEM
Does not take into account that these factors may interact with each other
Stressors might not be also not just for a point and be ongoing
Also, response to one event might be negative for some, but positive for others so does not take into account that
Stress as a process of transactions: Transactional model
Lazarus suggested that stress involved a set of transactions between an individual and their environment. Lazarus recognised that there are 2 basic forms of cognitive appraisal: primary and secondary.
Primary appraisal involves an appraisal of the outside world, irrelevant, benign-positive and stressful. The secondary appraisal then involves an appraisal of the individual themselves, the pros and cons of their coping strategies. The form of the primary and the secondary appraisal will then determine whether the individual shows a stress response or not.
It
Limitations
Does appraisal always influence the stress response? What happens in stituations when the individual has no time to appraise,
Gomes et al 2017
Evidence for the transactional model of stress
In a cohort of 673 young athletes measures of anxiety, cognitive appraisal, and burnout were examined. Results indicated that cognitive appraisal as an important factor in explaining young athletes’ burnout experience. If young athletes perceive the sports activity as less stressful and threatening and more challenging, they experience less burnout. Higher threat perception is related to increased burnout.
Other factors affecting the stress response
Personality factors - Scott et al 2007 - Type D personality are socially inhibited, angrier and more stressed.
Novelty, Predictability and Actual or perceived control could also affect stress.
Treatment for stress
Exercise - Ogden - Can affect cognition, though I’m stressed so I exercise
Dumont et al 1999
Social support
Who provided evidence for the transactional model of stress in 670 athletes in 2017?
Gomes et al 2017
Cognitive appraisal as measured indicated that those who perceived the activity as less stressful but more challenging had less burnout but those with higher challenge increased burnout
