AHLCON INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL

PSYCHOLOGY NOTES
CLASS XII
STRESS

STRESS: The pattern of responses an organism makes to stimulus event that disturbs
the equilibrium and exceeds a person’s ability to cope.

 All challenges, problems and difficult circumstances put us to stress.

STRESSORS: Events that cause stress

 Different stressors produce different patterns of stress reactions. Individuals have
different modes of response

TYPES OF STRESS
1. Eustress: Helps enhance performance, drives you, is good for you
2. Distress: Too much stress, can’t be managed, may lead to breakdown

 Stress is derieved from the Latin word, stringere (tighten) and strictus (tight/narrow)

STRAIN: Reaction to external stressors

NATURE OF STRESS:
 HANS SELYE: Father of modern stress research.
 Non specific response
 Regardless of cause, physiological reaction is the same

 LAZARUS AND COLLEAGUES:

 Disagreed with Hans S
 Said stress response differs from individual depending on the appraisal and
perception
 COGNITIVE theory of stress: using thought process
 How we respond depends on APPRAISAL.

Appraisal

Primary Secondary

Negative Positive

Secondary
  Primary appraisal: Perception of a new environment- positive, negative
neutral
 Negative-
 Harm: Assessment of the damage that has already been done by an
event
 Threat: Assessment of possible future damage that may be bought by
the change
 Challenge: Confident expectations of the ability to cope with the
stressful event, potential to overcome and even profit from the event.
 Secondary appraisal: Is done with an event is perceived as stressful.
 Is assessment of whether one’s coping abilities and skills and if they’ll
be enough to meet harm/threat/challenge of event
 Resouces may be mental, physical, social or personal.
 If one thinks they have the positive attitude, health, skills and social
support to deal with the crises, the person will feel less stressed
 Two level appraisal process determines cognitive, behavioural, emotional and
physiological responses

 FACTORS THAT DETERMINE SECONDARY APPRAISAL

 PAST EXPERIENCE: If one has handled similar situations well in the past,
they would be perceived as less threatening
 CONTROLLABLE: Whether one has mastery or control over the situation-
A person who believes that they can control the onset/consequences of a
negative situation will experience less amount of stress.- Self efficacy and
confidence determines whether the person will view a situation as a challenge
or threat
 DIMENSIONS of STRESSORS vary in terms of:
 Intensity (low intensity vs high intensity)
 Duration (short term vs long term)
 Complexity (less complex vs more complex)
 Predictability (unexpected vs predictable)
Intense, prolonged, complex and unexpected stressors have more
negative consequences.
 INDIVIDUAL CHARACTERISTICS
 Physiological: People with poor health, weak constitution are more
vulnerable
 Cultural: Expected response style, determines meaning of event
 Psychological: Mental health, temperament, self concept
 RESOURCES OF A PERSON:
 Physical: Money, food, shelter
 Personal: coping style, social skills etc
  Social: support network

STRESS REACTIONS
 Physiological:
 Hypothalamus initiates actions along two pathways
 First pathway involves autonomic nervous system
 Adrenal gland releases catecholamines (epinephrine and
norepinephrine)→leads to fight or flight response
 Second pathway involves pituitary gland which secretes corticosteroid
(cortisol) which provides energy
 Cognitive
 Inability to concentrate- Lower attention
 Intrusive thoughts
 Poor decision making
 Forgetfulness
 Emotional: Aggression, withdrawal, irritation, sadness, anxiety, helplessness
 Behavioural
 Can be fight (confront stressor) or flight (withdraw from threatening event,
keep to self).
 To deal may stop eating, use cigarettes, alcohol, drugs

TYPES OF STRESSORS:
 Environmental and physical: Physical stressors cause changes in our body’s state
(include sleep deprivation, lack of nutritious food, over exertion, injuries).
Environmental stressors include air pollution, fire, floods, crowding. They’re
unavoidable
 Social: Induced externally, result from our interaction with others. Eg: strained
relationships, trouble with neighbours
 Psychological: Internal sources of stress , personal and unique.
 Frustration: Obstacle blocking path to goal achievement
 Conflict: Choosing between two or more incompatible goals. Eg: Study
psychology or dance
 Internal pressures: putting pressure on self, unrealistically high expectations
from ourselves
 Social pressures: Are external, from people who make excessive demands
from us, include when we interact with people with whom we face
interpersonal difficulties. Eg: peer pressure, pressure to get into college
(Social stressors include broken relationships, divorce- stress from your
relationships etc and external pressures include pressure that teachers, peers,
parents put on us)
SOURCES OF STRESSORS
1. Life events: Major life events are stressful because they disturb our routine and cause
upheaval. May be planned (moving to a new house) or unpredicted (break up of a
long term relationship). Numerous changes in a short period of time→ difficult to
cope with them
2. Hassles: Personal stresses we endure as individual due to daily happenings. Eg:
traffic jams, noisy surroundings. In some jobs, daily hassles are high, may not even be
noticeable by outsiders. More stress due to daily hassles→ poorer psychological well
being
3. Traumatic events: Extreme events such as fire, earthquake, tsunami. Effects may
occur after some lapse of time as symptoms of anxiety, flashbacks, intrusive thoughts,
and dreams. Severe trauma may strain relationships. Professional help will be needed
to help cope

EFFECTS OF STRESS:
1. Emotional: Mood swings, erratic behaviour- may lead to alienation, decreasing
confidence leading to more serious emotional problems, anxiety, depressin, physical
tension, psychological tension
2. Physiological: Adrenaline and cortisol production increases. Changes in heart rate,
blood pressure, metabolism, physical activity, release of epinephrine and
noepinephrine, slowing down of the digestive systems, expansion of air passages,
increased heart rate, and constriction of blood vessels.
3. Cognitive: Mental overload, faulty decisions, poor concentration, reduced short term
memory
4. Behavioural: Eat less food, increase intake of stimulants including caffeine,
cigarettes, alcohol, disturbed seep patterns, increased absenteeism, reduced work
performance

GENERAL ADAPTATION SYNDROME

 Given by Hans Selye
 Studied influence of prolonged stress on our body by subjecting animals to stressors
 Three stages:
1. Alarm reaction
2. Resistance
3. Exhaustion
 Alarm reaction: Presence of a stressors leads to activation of adrenal-pituitary-cortex
system. Triggers release of hormones producing stress response. Individual is ready for
fight or flight
 Resistance: If stress is prolonged, resistance begins. Parasympathetic nervous system
calls for more cautious use of body’s resources. Organism makes effort to deal with the
threat through confrontation
 Exhaustion: Body is drained of its resources after sustained exposure to stressor, leads
to exhaustion. physiological systems in alarm reaction become ineffective, susceptibility
to stress related diseases such as high BP increases. May lead to burnout- fainting,
breakdown, fever, eruptions. Lead to psychosomatic ailments (heart disease, asthmatic
attacks)
 Criticism: Very limited role to psychological factors in stress

STRESS AND HEALTH

 Stress may lead to stomach ache, body aches, nausea, diarrhoea, fever
 Exhaustion and attitudinal problems when stress is high, constraints are high and
resources are low
 Chronic fatigue, weakness and low energy- Physical exhaustion
 Irritabilty, anxiety, helplessness, hopelessness- Mental exhaustion
 BURNOUT: State of physical, emotional and psychological exhaustion
 Affects immunity system
 Increases chances of cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure and psychosomatic
disorders like asthma, ulcers, allergies, headaches
 50-70% of illness is stress related, 60% medical visits for stress related symptoms

STRESS AND THE IMMUNE SYSTEM

 Immune system guards the body against attackers within and outside
 Excessive release of stress hormones affects immune system
 Stress impairs working of immune system
 Psychoneuroimmunology: link between mind, brain and immune system
 Leucocytes (white blood cells) identify and destroy antigens (foreign bodies) such as
viruses
 Also leads to the production of antibodies
 Leucocytes are of three types:
1. T cells: T cells destroy invaders and T-helper cells increase immunological
activity. T helper cells are attacked by HIV leading to AIDS
2. B cells: Produce antibodies
3. Natural killer cells: Involved in fight against tumour and viruses
 Stress affects natural killer cell cytotoxicity (defence against infections and viruses)
 Reduced levels of cytotoxicity have been found in stressed people including people
facing exams, bereaved people and severely depressed people
 Individuals with social support have better immune functioning
 People with already weakened systems are affected more
  Depression, hostility, anger and aggression accompany stress
 Psychological disorders increase with long term stress- prone to panic attacks,
obsessive behaviour, mood swings, phobias, depression, anger
 Feeling of hopelessness- worsening disease, increased risk of injury and death
 Worries may surface as a frightening, painful physical sensations

STRESS AND IMPACT ON LIFESTYLE

 Lifestyle is the overall pattern of decisions and behaviour that determine a
person’s health and quality of life.
 Stressed individuals are more likely to expose themselves to pathogens (agents
causing physical sickness)
 Poor nutritional habits, sleep less and engage in smoking and drinking
 Have long term risks
 Health promoting behaviour like having a balanced diet, regular sleep schedule,
exercise, family support helps
 Fast paced lifestyle, drinking, eating junk affects our health negatively

COPING WITH STRESS

Coping is a dynamic situation-specific response to stress.
 Concrete responses intend to resolve the problem and reduce stress
 Coping depends on rigid deep seated beliefs
 To manage stress- reassess way we think, learn coping strategies
 Individual differences in coping strategies
1. Lazarus and Folkman: Conceptualized coping as dynamic process instead of an
individual trait.
 Constantly changing cognitive ad behavioural efforts to master, reduce or tolerate the
internal or externl demands that are created by stressful interactions
 Allows individual to manage or alter a probem and regulate emotional response
 According them, coping responses were of two types:
 Problem focussed:
 Attack the problem itself with behaviours designed to gain information, to
alter the event and to alter beliefs and commitments
 Increases person’s awareness, level of knowledge and range of behavioural
and cognitive coping options
 Act to reduce threat value of event
 Eg: I made a plan of action and followed it
 Emotion-focussed:
 Psychological changes designed to limit the degree of emotional disruption
 Eg: I did some things and let it out of my system.
2. Endler and Parker:
 Task oriented strategy:
  Obtaining information about the stressful situation and about alternative
courses of action and their probable outcome
 Involves deciding priorities and acting as to deal with directly with the
stressful situation
 Eg: Schedule my time better, think about how I’ve solved similar problems
 Emotion oriented strategy:
 One’s efforts to maintain hope and efforts to control ones emotions
 Involving venting feelings of anger and frustration
 Deciding that nothing can be done to change things
 Eg: worrying about what I’m going to do
 Avoidance-oriented strategy:
 Denying or minimizing the seriousness of the situation
 Involves conscious suppression of stressful thoughts, replacement by self
protective thoughts
 Eg: Watching Tv/talking to a friend instead of studying

STRESS MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUES

1. Relaxation techniques:
 Reduces stress symptoms and decreases incidences of stress related illness like
heart disease
 Relaxation starts from lower part to the facial muscles
 Accompanied by deep breathing- calm minds, relax bodies
2. Exercise:
 Active outlet for physiological arousal experienced due to stress
 Exercise improves heart efficiency, improves lung function, maintains good
circulation, reduces BP, reduces fat and improves immune system
 Swimming, walking, running, cycling helps reduce stress
 4 times a week, 30 minutes a time minimum
 Warm up, exercise and cooldown phases
3. Biofeedback
 Procedure to monitor and reduce physiological aspects of stress by providing
feedback about current physiological activity and often accompanied by
relaxation training
 Three stages:
a) Developing an awareness of the particular physiological response (eg: heart
rate)
b) Learning ways to control that physiological response in quiet conditions
c) Transferring that control into the conditions of everyday life
4. Meditation procedures
 Involves a sequence of learned techniques for refocusing attention that brings
about an altered state of consciousness
 Through deep concentration, mediator becomes unaware of any outside
stimulation and reaches a different state of consciousness
5. Cognitive behavioural techniques
  Stress inoculation training- by Meichenbaum
 Replace negative and irrational thoughts with positive rational thoughts
 Three main phases:
a) Assessment: discussing nature of problem, eeing it from viewpoint of
person/client
b) Stress reduction techniques: learning techniques of reducing stress such
as relaxation, stress reduction
c) Application+ follow through
6. Creative visualisation:
 Subjective experience that uses imagery and imagination
 Before visualising- set a realistic goal as it helps build confidence
 Easier to visualize if one’s mind is quiet, body relaxed, and eyes are
closed
 This reduces risk of interference from unbidden thoughts and provides
creative energy to turn imagined scene into reality

PROMOTING POSITIVE HEALTH AND WELLBEING

 Many people sail through and rebuild their lives positively
 Have constructive attitudes and emotional and social support
 Need to manage these pressures+ use energy to create something positive-more stress fit for
future crises

Stress resistant personality:

 Given by Kobasa
 People with high levels of stress but low levels of illness share three characteristics
which are referred to as personality traits of hardiness
 Hardiness is set of beliefs of ones self, environment and their interaction
 Three Cs
 Commitment: Personal commitment, commitment to work, family, hobbies,
social life
 Control: Control over life, have sense of purpose and direction
 Challenge: See changes as normal and positive rather than as a threat
Since all of us don’t have these characteristics, we relearn specific life skills instead to cope
with demands of everyday life

LIFE SKILLS
 Abilities for adaptive and positive behaviour that enable individuals to deal
effectively with the demands and challenges of everyday life
 Ability to cope depends on how well we’re prepared to deal with everyday demands
and maintain equilibrium
 Can be learnt and improved upon
1. Assertiveness:
  Behaviour or skill that helps to communicate, clearly and confidently our
feelings, needs, wants and thoughts
 Ability to say no to a request, state opinions without being self conscious, or to
express emotions such as love, anger etc openly
 Assertive- confident, high self esteem, solid sense of your identity
2. Time management
 Learning how to plan and delegate time relieves pressure
 Way you spend time- determines quality of life
 To reduce time stress- change one perception of time
 Spend time doing things you value/help you achieve goals
 Depends on being realistic about what you know, understanding it must be
done in a time frame and knowing what you want to do- have to find a balance
3. Rational thinking
 Stress related problems: result of distorted thinking
 Way you think and way you feel is connected
 When stressed, we have inbuilt bias to attent to negative thoughts and images
from the past which affects our perception of the past and future
 Principles of rational thinking:
i. Challenging distorted thinking and irrational beliefs
ii. Driving out potentially intrusive negative anxiety provoking thoughts
iii. Making positive statements
4. Improving relationships
 Communication is essential
 Need to avoid jealousy+ sulking behaviour
 Three skills:
i. Listening to what the other person has to say
ii. Expressing how you feel and what you think
iii. Accepting others opinions and beliefs even if they differ from ours
5. Self care
 Must keep ourselves healthy, fit and relaxed to deal with stressors
 Breathing patterns- reflect our state of mind- stressed and anxious: rapid and
shallow breathing from high in chest with frequent sighs, relaxed breathing:
slow, stomach-centred breathing from diaphragm
 Environmental stressors like noise, pollution, space, light exert an influence on
our mood
6. Overcoming unhelpful habits
 Includes perfectionism, avoidance, procrastination etc
 Perfectionists: have to get everything just right, have difficulty in varying
standards according to factors like time, effort needed, consequences of not
being able to stop work
 Find it difficult to relax, v critical of themselves and others, may be inclined to
avoid challenges
 Avoidance: push issue under carpet and refuse to accept it or face it
  Procrastination: putting off what we need to do- are actually avoiding
confronting their fears of failure of rejection

POSITIVE HEALTH
 Health is not just absence of disease, but is physical, mental, social and spiritual well
being
 Positive health comprises of:
i. Healthy body
ii. High quality of personal relationships
iii. Sense of purpose in life
iv. Mastery of life’s tasks
v. Resilience to stress, trauma and change

Factors that facilitate positive heath and act as stress buffers:

1. Diet:
 Balanced diet improves one’s mood, gives energy, feeds muscles, improves
circulation, prevents illness, strengthens the immune system and makes one
better cope to deal with stresses
 Eat three main meals
 Eat a varied well balanced diet
 Nutrition: depends on activity level, genetic makeup, cimate, health history
 What people eat and how much they weigh- depends on behavioural
processes
 When stressed- we seek comfort foods- high in fat, salt, sugar
2. Exercise:
 Regular exercise- manages weight and stress-positive effect on reducing
tension anxiety, depression
 Stretching exercises (yogic asanas) and aerobic exercise such as jogging,
swimming, cycling are essential
 Stretching: calming effect, aerobic activity: increases arousal level of body
 Health benefits of exercise: works as stress buffer, can maintain mental and
physical health being even in face of negative life events
3. Positive attitude:
 Factors leading to positive attitude-
 Accurate perception of reality
 Sense of purpose in life and responsibility
 Acceptance and tolerance for different viewpoints
 Taking credit for success and accepting blame for failure
 Open to new ideas
 Sense of humour- ability to laugh at ourselves- helps us remain centred
and see things in a proper light
4. Positive thinking:
 Optimism-linked to psychological and physical well being
  Optimists assume that adversity can be handled successfully whereas
pessimists anticipate disasters
 Optimists: problem focussed coping strategies, seek advice and help from
others
 Pessimists ignore the problem- may give up goal with which stress is
interfering or deny stress exists
5. Social support: Existence and availability of people we can rely on, people who
let us know they care/value/love us.
 Someone who believes that they belong to a social network of
communications and mutual obligations experiences social support
 Perceived support: quality of social support is positively related to health
and well being
 Social network: quantity of social support is unrelated to well being,
because its time consuming and demanding to maintain a large social
network
 Provides protection against stress, help people cope with stress
 Eg: Women who experienced life stresses and had a close friend, were less
likely to be depressed
 Reduces psychological distress like depression and anxiety- linked to
psychological well being
 Mental health benefits for giver and receiver
Types of social support:
i. Tangible support: involves material support- money, goods, services Eg: Providing
financial support to cope with a crisis
ii. Informational support: Eg- If a student is about to face a stressful exam and his
friend (who has given the exam before) provides him with information, he would be
able to identify procedure, resources and coping strategies that could be used to
successfully pass the exam
iii. Emotional support: Reassuring individual they are valued, loved and cared for.