Stress

Question 1

How does stress influence health?

Answer 1

Physiologically
Health habits
Heath services/disease management

Question 2

What are the 3 ways to define stress and who started them?

Answer 2

1) Physiological Response: Cannon, Selye, Taylor, McEwen
2) Environmental Stimulus: Holmes & Rahe
3) Person-environment Transaction: Lazarus

Question 3

What is the Response definition of stress?

Answer 3

Response of unpleasant or threatening stimulus (stressor)
Varying stressors = same pattern of response
SAM and HPA axis

Question 4

What is the fight or flight response?

Answer 4

Walter Cannon
Fight: agressive response, mobilize energy to fight
Flight: withdrawl

Quick response, uses the SAM system

Question 5

What is the Sam system?

Answer 5

Sympathetic Adrenal Medullary System:
Autonomic, unconcious control

sympathetic: fight or flight
parasympathetic: restore energy (rest / digest)

Adrenal Glands: secrete catecholamines, help w stress responses

Epinephrine and Norepinephrine

Body changes: heart rate, blood pressure, faster breathing, sweating

Question 6

Who had the idea of homeostasis?

Answer 6

Walter Cannon

Question 7

Who was Hans Selye ?

Answer 7

General adaptation syndrome

He exposed rats to different stressors and found the same physiological changes
- argued response is not specific to stressor

This helps us invertene and help ppl

Question 8

What are the phases of General Adaptation Syndrome?

Answer 8

Selye

1. Alarm, initial shock, fight or flight. Hpa may kick in
2. Resistance: body adapts to stress, continued HPA activation. Continued release of cortisol
3. Exhaustion : physical damage and disease, HPA axis disregulated

Question 9

Describe the HPA axis and cortisol

Answer 9

Hypothalamic, Pituitary, Adrenal axis.

Hypothalamus secretes CRF (corticotropin releasing factor) to pituitary which releases ATCH which goes to adrenal glands which release corticosteroids (cortisol)

Cortisol isn’t just for stress, it helps us mobilize energy. But it dampens inflammitory response, reduces digestion and increases glucose absorption.

Can become disregulated over time due to chronic stress.
Disregulated cortisol pattern can cause development of health conditions: CVD, metabolic issues, mental disorders and even death

Takes a bit longer to kick in

Question 10

What are criticisms of the Response definition of stress?

Answer 10

Not all responses are the exact same
Ppl differ in reactivity to stress (men and women)
It ignores subjective feelings/appraisals and coping

Question 11

What is the Tend-and-Befriend hypothesis?

Answer 11

Shelley Taylor
- ppl respond to stress with social affiliation and nurturing behaviors

Role of OXYTOCIN (love hormone/bonding intimacy)
- high levels show social bonding, calmness, relaxation

Under stress, females are likely to ‘tend and befriend’
Promotes suspicion to outgroup members, more protective of children, more wary of others that may pose danger

Question 12

What is allostatic load?

Answer 12

McEwen
Cumulative wear and tear on the body when exposed to chronic stress.
Develops over a long time, physiological responses add up, over different systems.
Studied via blood tests

Allostatis: deviation from a set point. Increase in heart rate, HPA and SAM responses

Question 13

What are important features of the physiological stress response?

Answer 13

Exposure: how frequent/intense/long lasting
Reactivity: magnitude of change in reaction to stressors (physiologically) - different with everyone
Recovery: how long it takes to recover to baseline after a stressor is over

Question 14

Describe the Environmental Stimulus Definition of Stress ! (who did it?)

Answer 14

Holmes and Rahe and the social readjustment rating scale.
Stress= life change (positive or negative)
- ranging from death of a spouse to a parking ticket

Question 15

What are criticisms of the stimulus/environmental definition of stress?

Answer 15

• points are based on normative ratings (no personal impact of event)
  Change isn’t always stressful
  No change can be stressful too
  Other chronic/daily stressors are ignored

Major life changes are sources of stress, not the stress itself

Many items are confounded with health conditions/illnesses
Retrospective contamination (change in martial arguments, or problem with in laws)
- Third Variable problem

Small relationship between life events and illness (0.12 r)

Question 16

What personality trait is linked to less health issues?

Answer 16

Consienciousness!

Question 17

What is the transactional definition of stress?

Answer 17

the Person Environment one by RICHARD LAZARUS

• transactions between person and environment
• APPRAISALS: environmental demands and our ability to cope with them

Takes into account person (control/personality/thoughts) and situation

Ongoing process, we adjust it constantly. Stress is a process.

Interpretation is the important part

Question 18

According to transactional definition, how is stress defined?

Answer 18

Stress: when the person believes that demands exceed their resources

• interpretation of stressful events is more important than the events themselves
• stress is determined by
  1) the person (neuroticism, vulnerability)
  2) the stressor (controllability, intensity)

Question 19

What are the two types of cognitive appraisal?

Answer 19

Primary: assessment of whether there is anything at stake in this encounter
(significance, pos/neg/neutral consequences)
- negative has 3 components
1) harm loss (Damage done)
2) threat (Damage in future)
3) challenge (possible for benefit)

Secondary: assessment of whether one can cope with the demands of the situation.
“ I can/might/can’t handle this”
determines stress

Question 20

What is reappraisal? Positive reappraisal?

Answer 20

continuous re-assessment based on new information -similar initial process but can lead to more/less stress.

Positive reappraisal: susan folkman worked on lazeras’s ideas with people who had partners with HIV, taking care of dying loved ones having to ‘positively reframe’ their situations
Positive reappraisal is re framing something to see it in a positive light “this is difficult but worthwhile, my efforts are valuable”

Question 21

What makes events stressful?

Answer 21

More stressful when perceived as

1) uncontrollable or unpredictable
2) ambiguous (vs clear cut)
3) Overload
4) involve central life goals

• doesn’t account for past experiences, might be more susceptible to a certain stressor

Question 22

What are criticisms of the transactional definition?

Answer 22

Appraisals don’t account for the effects of stressors on health (stress has an effect that aren’t fully explained by your perception , there are objective aspects too!!)
Blames the victim
Too much focus on subjective experience.

Question 23

What are methods for examining stress?

Answer 23

1) Social Readjustment Rating scale
2) Biomarkers
3) Trier Social Stress Test
4) Perceieved Stress scale (transactional)
5) Daily and chronic stress

Question 24

What are biomarkers of stress response?

Answer 24

Heart rate
Blood pressure
Blood/urine/saliva for stress hormones
SAM system: EPI and NE from urine
HPA: cortisol from saliva or blood

Question 25

What is the Trier Social Stress test?

Answer 25

Participant has to give a speech and do mental math in front of a panel to reliably stress people out.

pro: reliable
con: limited ecological validity

Developed in germany, how ppl respond to the same stressor

ppl do worse on this if they ruminate a lot

Doesn’t reflect stressors of daily life!!

Question 26

How do we measure stress in daily life?

Answer 26

Surveys multiple times a day
Saliva Samples
Wearable sensors

Repeated assessments are the best to study fluctuations

Question 27

How do emotional reactions to stressors predict health and well being?

Answer 27

Reactivity to daily stressors are more important for health than exposure (# of) stressors

• worse health behaviors (sleep/inactivity)
• physiological health risks (inflammation, dystregulated cortisol)
• longer term outcomes (worse financial well being, mental/physical health, mortality risk, net worth)

people who are moer reactive have a greater risk for developing disorders

Question 28

What is the percieved stress scale?

Answer 28

Sheldon Cohen
- transactional model of stress, about feelings about stress.
less objective/physiological reaction and more subjective

Could predict susceptibility to the common cold

Question 29

What are norms for the percieved stress scale?

How does stress effect the immune system?

Answer 29

high stress, 16%, low stress 16%, average stress 68%!!
can predict the common cold, immune system

Sheldon Cohen says cytocine is a marker of suceptibility to a cold. Stress manipulates regulation of cytocine. Measured via nasal drops (virus and saline) quarantine and evaluated

Question 30

What were the outcomes of Sheldon Cohen’s viral infection experiement.

Answer 30

Clinical cold: viral infection and cold symptoms.
Viral infection: increased antibodies or nasal samples

higher stress categories indicated more viral infection and more clinical colds

Question 31

What are the hypotheses for social support benefiting health?

Answer 31

1. Direct Effects - social relationships influence health regardless of stress (sheldon cohen)
2. Stress Buffering - social relationships influence health by protecting ppl when they are under stress

Question 32

What are the 4 types of social support

Answer 32

What makes ppl feel cared for/valued/part of a group

1. Tangible (material/services)
2. Informational (Advice and information)
3. Emotional
4. Companionship (being part of a group/team etc.)