Stress

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GAS model by Selye 1936

Selye believes that stress caused a long term adaptation that followed a 3 stage pattern which he named the general adaption syndrome (GAS), this GAS is a term that describes the body's reactions and adaptions to stress in order to reach homeostasis. The 3 stages are:

Alarm- Fight or flight response

Resistance- The body adapts to the stressor

exhaustion- This occurs when long term stress isn't removed

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Work by Chandla 2008

Work place stress is a result of conflict between the demands of a job and the persons ability to meet the demands. Stress at work is linked to higher risk of getting CHD (coronary heart disease) however reasoning why still remains unclear. Chandla wanted to determine to biological and behavioural factors linking work to stress. To do this Chandla analysed work from a previous study, the previous study had a sample of 10308 participants, they all filled out self reports and clinical data was also collected. The evidence from this previous study suggestedthat workers who report work stress more often have increased risk of heart disease and obesity. Chandla recorded all the heart attacks (fatle and non-fatel) during this study, they also collected the info on biological risk factors for heart disease. The results of this study showed that cumulative work stress is high risk factor for developing CHD.

The "previous study" I refer to is called the Whitehall 2 study

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Life events by Holmes & Rate 1976

This study looked at what makes a situation stressful, they suggest that living though stressful life events could lead to a health impact. They used medical case histories and interviews, they used a large number of people who were suffering or had suffered with lots of stress. From this data they developed a scale which ranked events.

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Personality by Friedman & Rosenman 1974

They believed that stress came from the individual and that a persons personality will determine if they are susceptible to stress or not. They categorised personalities into type A and type B

Type A characteristics- Very competitive, fast worker, strong desire to succeed, likes control and prone to suffer stress

Type B characteristics- Non-competitive, slower worker, lacking in desire to succeed, doesn't like control and is less prone to stress

This study found that people who seemed to be particularly susceptible to CHD also tended to have the same personality type. In the study they used 3000 healthy men who were assessed to determine personality type. It was found that out of the 257 men that died 70% were in the type A group. To concluded people who are in the type A group are more susceptible to stress and therefor stress related illness such as CHD. This is a longitudinal research as people were studied over a long period of time.

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Psychological measures by Wang 2005

This study uses brain imaging techniques, an FMRI machine can measure activity in the brain by detecting changes involving blood flow. Wang's study used an FMRI scanner and a technique called arterial spin-labelling perfusion MRI (this is just a fancy phrase for seeing where blood goes too in the brain). The data from these scans can be used to show how the brain is working during different tasks, in Wang's study he used 32 participants who were split into either a stress group or the control, participants were than asked to perform mental arithmetic's while in the scanner. Thought-out the task they were asked to speed up and had to restart if and error occurred, (this was all in the high stress condition by the way). The low stress condition patients couldn't backwards from 1000 (which in my opinion is still very stressful). Also saliva samples were taken after each test for cortisol levels. The results show that neuro imaging evidence that psychological stress induces negative emotion, we also see that the right prefrontal cortex plays a key role in the central stress response. Cortisol is part of the fight or flight response to fear or stress which is why it was measured in this study.

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Psychological measures Evans & Wener 2007

They wanted to see if stress while traveling was due to personal space being intruded. The study used 139 adult commuters, who had been doing the same route for a minimum of 12 months. (the participants were given a free months train pass for their participation). They measured the "stress" by measuring carriage density and seat density which was done by dividing the total number of passengers by the total number of seats (Carrie density). Seat density was calculated by dividing the number of people sitting on the same row as them by the total number of seats on the row (5). Salivary cortisol was collected from each participant though chewable swabs, the results showed that density of the carriage made no difference to stress levels but seating density near the passenger greatly affected both self reported stress and cortisol stress.

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Psychological measures by Rahe 1970

In this study Rahe tests reliability of the "life events scale" with 2500 military members to rank stressful events in their life against the scale. He tracked the men for 6 months and it was recorded anything they went to seek medical advice, this was to see if there was a correlation between high stress and illness. The study proven the reliability of the scale as there was a positive correlation between doctor visits and stressful lives

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Psychological techniques- Biofeedback and Imagery by Budzynski 1969

With the use of electrodes attached to the skin an electromechanical device can read physiological processes such as heart rate or muscle tension. This information gets reported back to the person and they can see what effects things eg if you have tension in your neck muscles and the machine reports a decrease in tension then this information in-forces whatever efforts the individual made to decrease it. The machine also produces tones depending on physiological activity, as the patient gets better at relaxing they hear a low tone (muscles are relaxed). Biofeedback helps people control their stress response by realising when its happening, it also helps by teaching relaxation techniques. Budzynski wanted to assess the effect of biofeedback back on tension induced headaches, there were 15 participants and they were randomly allocated to either the experimental group (who were told the pitch of the tone would vary with the level of muscle tension in the forehead) the other two groups were control groups (control group 1 was give a constant low tone and told it would help them relax) the final group had no tones and was told to relax in silence. The results showed the experimental group was most effective over 5 sessions.

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Imagery (Bridge 1988)

This tactic for managing stress is done by visualising yourself in a calm and peaceful location, where you can relax. The study by Bridge 1988 was done to see the effectiveness of this therapy on a woman who was being treated for cancer. Bridge wanted to see if stress could be reduced in patients who were being treated with radiotherapy for early breast cancer using a controlled randomised trial. The study used 139 women who were having a radiotherapy course. Patients filled out a self report before the treatment and after to show depressive or anxiety symptoms. They also completed a mood scale, the woman were in 1 of 3 conditions; relaxation, relaxation plus imagery or a control condition. There were no significant difference on the self report but on the mood scale was improved, this meant that the relaxation positively affected mood state and it was even better when relaxation was parired with imagery. (bridge also reported that the woman would smile during the relaxation images)

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Preventing stress by Meichenbaum 1985

This uses stress inoculation training (SIT) The main idea is that stress isn't an obstacle its a creative opportunity like a puzzle. SIT is a form of cognitive behavioural therapy because it gets patients to try and recognise their cognitions (though process) that might trigger a stressful experience and then teach them how to relive or manage the stressful experience. The goal of SIT is to give the patient "weapons" (i'm using weapons as a fun replacement for coping strategies) against stress. Meichenbaum believed people could inoculated themselves to stress since stress is only a perception.

Cognitive therapy- This therapy is based on how a person thinks, usually the therapy is trying to change the way the person thinks to Improve their life quality

Behavioural therapy- People learn behaviours for many reasons but this therapy aims to produce more desirable behaviours

Cognitive behavioural therapy- This is a combination of the two (can be more cognitive or behavioural depending on the situation