stress

Examples of stress in the following topics:

• Managing Stress Through Conventional and Alternative Medicine

  • Stress management resources aim to control or diminish a person's level of stress through both conventional and alternative methods.
  • Stress management resources aim to control a person's level of stress, whether chronic and recurring or acute and unique.
  • Stress management techniques provide a way to cope with stress and its symptoms to promote and maintain general well-being.
  • This finding led to the belief that stress was somehow outside of or beyond the control of the person experiencing stress.
  • This precept allows stress to be controlled by the person and provides the basis for most stress management techniques.

• How Stress Impacts our Health

  • Stress is a necessity for life and is a primary biological incentive for all.
  • Acute stress occurs in the short-term and is usually resolved rather quickly; chronic stress is long-term and usually unresolved, leading to a variety of problems.
  • Many people experience some type of depressive mood or feeling in relation to stress, and excessive amounts of stress has been shown to contribute to depression or anxiety.
  • One of the most serious ways that stress can impact psychological well-being is in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
  • Cortisol, also known as the "stress hormone", plays an integral role in our body's reaction to stress.

• Coping with Stress

  • In the case of stress, coping mechanisms seek to master, minimize, or tolerate stress and stressors that occur in everyday life.
  • The root of stress is the cognitive appraisal of an event as stressful or stress-inducing.
  • Men and women also assess stress differently but tend to cope with stress similarly.
  • Some cultures promote a head-on approach to stress and provide comforting environments for managing stressful situations, while others encourage independence and self-sufficiency when it comes to coping with stress.
  • A person's perception of stress and ability to cope with that stress are products of many different influences in life.

• Introduction to Stress

  • One basic definition of stress is "a psychological feeling of strain and pressure."
  • Stress can be either positive (eustress) or negative (distress).
  • Eustress, or positive stress, on the other hand, is the positive emotional or cognitive response to stress that is healthy; it gives a feeling of fulfillment or happiness.
  • Stress management is the application of methods to either reduce stress or increase tolerance to stress.
  • Relaxation techniques are physical methods used to relieve stress.

• The Endocrine System and Stress

  • Stress is the simple name for what happens when the body's emergency response is activated; a stressful event is one that activates the sympathetic (fight-or-flight) nervous system.
  • In experimental studies in rats, a distinction is often made between social stress and physical stress, but both types activate the HPA axis, albeit through different pathways.
  • Stress hormone release tends to decline gradually after a stressor occurs.
  • In post-traumatic stress disorder there appears to be lower-than-normal cortisol release, and it is thought that a blunted hormonal response to stress may predispose a person to develop PTSD.
  • Children who were stressed prenatally may show altered cortisol rhythms.

• Specific Effects of Stress: Cancer

  • While psychological stress alone has not been proven to cause cancer, prolonged psychological stress may affect a person's overall health and ability to cope with cancer.
  • Psychological stress describes what people feel when they are under mental, physical, or emotional pressure.
  • People who have cancer may find the physical, emotional, and social effects of the disease to be stressful.
  • However, there is no evidence that successful management of psychological stress improves cancer survival.
  • Emotional and social support can help cancer patients learn to cope with psychological stress.

• Stress and Cardiovascular Disease

  • Medical researchers are not sure exactly how stress increases the risk of heart disease.
  • If stress itself is a risk factor for heart disease, it could be because chronic stress exposes your body to unhealthy, persistently elevated levels of stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol.
  • However, managing one's stress levels and finding healthy outlets for stress is a crucial component for preventing cardiovascular disease.
  • Things like yoga, meditation, reducing one's workload, and taking personal time to relax can reduce stress levels, aid in stress management, and reduce the risk of heart disease.
  • Stress can lead to blockages of the arteries, known as atherosclerosis.

• How the Body Responds to Stress

  • The body responds to stress in certain physiological ways.
  • Although our bodies can respond to and deal with stress in the short term, long-term exposure to stress hormones can have detrimental effects.
  • The sympathetic nervous system regulates the stress response via the hypothalamus.
  • Stressful stimuli cause the hypothalamus to signal the adrenal medulla (which mediates short-term stress responses) via nerve impulses, and the adrenal cortex (which mediates long-term stress responses) via the hormone adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH), which is produced by the anterior pituitary.
  • While psychological stress alone has not been proven to cause cancer, prolonged psychological stress may affect a person's overall health and ability to cope with cancer.

• Maintaining Motivation

  • In psychology, stress is a feeling of strain and pressure.
  • Stress produces numerous symptoms, which vary according to person, situation, and severity.
  • Research indicates that stress may also play a role in the development of tumors.
  • Small amounts of stress may be desirable, beneficial, and even healthy.
  • Excessive amounts of stress, however, may hinder performance and decrease motivation.

• The Value of Social Support in Managing Stress

  • The term "social coping" refers to a person seeking social support while under stress.
  • Social support plays a major role in successful stress management.
  • The stress and coping theory aligns with the buffering hypothesis; it states that social support protects people from the bad health effects of stressful events by influencing thought and coping ability.
  • The presence of a social network that can either be expected to provide or actually provides social support can have extremely positive effects on the experience of stress and successful stress management.
  • Discuss the roles of different kinds of social support in stress management