MODULE 2:
STRESS AND ANXIETY DISORDERS
SYLLABUS: stress and stressors coping strategies stress disorders adjustment disorder post traumatic disorder anxiety disorder specific
phobia social phobia generalized anxiety disorder ocd causal factor
• STRESS:
• The term stress has typically been use to refer both to the adjustive demands placed on an
organism and to the organism’s internal biological and psychological responses to such
demands.
• We will refer to adjustive demands as stressors, to the effects they create within an organism as
stress, and to efforts to deal with stress as coping strategies.
• According to Canadian physiologist Hans Selye (1956, 1976a), the notion of stress can be broken
down further into eustress (positive stress) and distress (negative stress). (In most cases, the
stress experienced during a wedding would be eustress: during a funeral, distress.) Both types of
stress tax a person’s resources and coping skills, though distress typically has the potential to do
more damage.
• Eustress: positive stress, a good kind of stress associated with positive feeling and optimal
health and performance.
• Distress: negative stress, when stress exceeds optimal level. People with distress feel burnout
fatigued and exhausted.
GENERAL ADAPTATION SYNDROM:
• Another important early contribution to stress was Hans Selye’s (1956, 1976) work on the general
adaptation.
• The Three Phases of Selye’s General Adaptation Syndrome
• Hans Selye, a pioneering stress researcher, formulated the General Adaptation Syndrome. He
proposed that people go through three phases in response to stress.
• Phases in response to stress.
• The first is the alarm phase, in which the body reacts to a stressor with diminished resistance .
• In the second stage, the stage of resistance that follows continued exposure to a stressor, stress
responses rise above normal.
• The third phase, exhaustion, results from long-term exposure to the stressor, and at this point,
resistance will fall below normal.
• Syndrome.Selye exposed rats to a variety of stressors, such as extreme cold and fatigue, and
observed their physiological responses.
• To his surprise, all stressors, regardless of type, produced essentially the same pat- tern of
physiological changes. They all led to an enlarged adrenal cortex, shrinking of the thymus and
lymph glands, and ulceration of the stomach and duodenum.
• From these observations, Selye (1956) developed the general adaptation syndrome.
• He argued that when a person confronts a stressor, it mobilizes itself for action
,• The response itself is nonspecific with respect to the stressor; that is, regardless of the cause of the
threat, the person will respond with the same physiological pat- tern of reactions.
• The response itself is nonspecific with respect to the stressor; that is, regardless of the cause of the
threat, the person will respond with the same physiological pat- tern of reactions.
• (As will be seen, this particular conclusion as now been challenged.) Over time, with repeated or
prolonged exposure to stress, there will be wear and tear on the system.
• The general adaptation syndrome consists of three phases.
• In the first phase, alarm, the person becomes mobilized to meet the threat.
• In the second phase, resistance , the person makes efforts to cope with the threat, as through
confrontation.
• The third phase, exhaustion, occurs if the person fails to overcome the threat and depletes its
physiological resources in the process of trying.
Factors Predisposing a Person to Stress
Everyone faces a unique pattern of demands to which he or she must adjust. This is because
people perceive and interpret similar situations differently and also because, objectively, no two
people are faced with exactly the same pattern of stressors.
Some individuals are also more likely to develop long-term problems under stress than others.
This may be linked, in part, to coping skills and the presence of particular resources. Children,
for example, are particularly vulnerable to severe stressors such as war and terrorism
Research also suggests that adolescents with depressed parents are more sensitive to stressful
events; these adolescents are also more likely to have problems with depression themselves
after experiencing stressful life events than those who do not have depressed parents
Individual characteristics that have been identified as improving a person’s ability to handle life
stress include higher levels of optimism, greater psychological control or mastery, increased self-
esteem, and better social support
A major development in stress research was the discovery that a particular form of a particular
gene (the 5HTTLPR gene) was linked to how likely it was that people would become depressed
in the face of life stress.
The amount of stress we experience early in life may also make us more sensitive to stress later
on. The effects of stress may be cumulative, with each stressful experience serving to make the
system more reactive.
, Stressful experiences may also create a self-perpetuating cycle by changing how we think about,
or appraise, the things that happen to us. Studies have shown that stressful situations may be
related to or intensified by a person’s cognitions.
The term stress tolerance refers to a person’s ability to withstand stress without becoming
seriously impaired.
Stressor: environmental events that may be judged as threatening or demanding that initiates
stress.
Characteristics of Stressors
The key factors involve
the severity of the stressor, Stressors that involve the more important aspects of a person’s life
—such as the death of a loved one, a divorce, a job loss, a serious illness, or negative social
exchanges—tend to be highly stressful for most people (Aldwin, 2007; Newsom et al., 2008).
its chronicity (i.e., how long it lasts), Furthermore, the longer a stressor operates, the more
severe its effects. A person may be frustrated in a boring and unrewarding job from which there
is seemingly no escape, suffer for years in an unhappy and conflict-filled marriage, or be severely
frustrated by a physical limitation or a long-term health problem.
its timing, Encountering a number of stressors at the same time also makes a difference. If a
man loses his job, learns that his wife is seriously ill, and receives news that his son has been
arrested for selling drugs, all at the same time, the resulting stress will be more severe than if
these events occurred separately and over an extended period.
how closely it affects our own lives, Symptoms of stress also intensify when a person is more
closely involved in an immediately traumatic situation. Learning that the uncle of a close friend
was injured in a car accident is not as stressful as being in an accident oneself.
how expected it is, Extensive research has shown that events that are unpredictable and
unanticipated (and for which no previously developed coping strategies are available) are likely
to place a person under severe stress. A devastating house fire and the damage it brings are not
occurrences with which anyone has learned to cope.
how controllable it is, Finally, with an uncontrollable stressor, there is no way to reduce its
impact, such as by escape or avoidance. In general, both people and animals are more stressed
by unpredictable and uncontrollable stressors than by stressors that are of equal physical
magnitude but are either predictable or controllable or both.
Coping strategies:
• Coping means to invest one’s own conscious effort to solve personal and interpersonal
problems in-order to try to master, minimize or tolerate stress and conflict.
• The psychological coping mechanisms are commonly termed as coping strategies or coping
skills. The term coping generally refers to adaptive (constructive) coping strategies.
STRESS AND ANXIETY DISORDERS
SYLLABUS: stress and stressors coping strategies stress disorders adjustment disorder post traumatic disorder anxiety disorder specific
phobia social phobia generalized anxiety disorder ocd causal factor
• STRESS:
• The term stress has typically been use to refer both to the adjustive demands placed on an
organism and to the organism’s internal biological and psychological responses to such
demands.
• We will refer to adjustive demands as stressors, to the effects they create within an organism as
stress, and to efforts to deal with stress as coping strategies.
• According to Canadian physiologist Hans Selye (1956, 1976a), the notion of stress can be broken
down further into eustress (positive stress) and distress (negative stress). (In most cases, the
stress experienced during a wedding would be eustress: during a funeral, distress.) Both types of
stress tax a person’s resources and coping skills, though distress typically has the potential to do
more damage.
• Eustress: positive stress, a good kind of stress associated with positive feeling and optimal
health and performance.
• Distress: negative stress, when stress exceeds optimal level. People with distress feel burnout
fatigued and exhausted.
GENERAL ADAPTATION SYNDROM:
• Another important early contribution to stress was Hans Selye’s (1956, 1976) work on the general
adaptation.
• The Three Phases of Selye’s General Adaptation Syndrome
• Hans Selye, a pioneering stress researcher, formulated the General Adaptation Syndrome. He
proposed that people go through three phases in response to stress.
• Phases in response to stress.
• The first is the alarm phase, in which the body reacts to a stressor with diminished resistance .
• In the second stage, the stage of resistance that follows continued exposure to a stressor, stress
responses rise above normal.
• The third phase, exhaustion, results from long-term exposure to the stressor, and at this point,
resistance will fall below normal.
• Syndrome.Selye exposed rats to a variety of stressors, such as extreme cold and fatigue, and
observed their physiological responses.
• To his surprise, all stressors, regardless of type, produced essentially the same pat- tern of
physiological changes. They all led to an enlarged adrenal cortex, shrinking of the thymus and
lymph glands, and ulceration of the stomach and duodenum.
• From these observations, Selye (1956) developed the general adaptation syndrome.
• He argued that when a person confronts a stressor, it mobilizes itself for action
,• The response itself is nonspecific with respect to the stressor; that is, regardless of the cause of the
threat, the person will respond with the same physiological pat- tern of reactions.
• The response itself is nonspecific with respect to the stressor; that is, regardless of the cause of the
threat, the person will respond with the same physiological pat- tern of reactions.
• (As will be seen, this particular conclusion as now been challenged.) Over time, with repeated or
prolonged exposure to stress, there will be wear and tear on the system.
• The general adaptation syndrome consists of three phases.
• In the first phase, alarm, the person becomes mobilized to meet the threat.
• In the second phase, resistance , the person makes efforts to cope with the threat, as through
confrontation.
• The third phase, exhaustion, occurs if the person fails to overcome the threat and depletes its
physiological resources in the process of trying.
Factors Predisposing a Person to Stress
Everyone faces a unique pattern of demands to which he or she must adjust. This is because
people perceive and interpret similar situations differently and also because, objectively, no two
people are faced with exactly the same pattern of stressors.
Some individuals are also more likely to develop long-term problems under stress than others.
This may be linked, in part, to coping skills and the presence of particular resources. Children,
for example, are particularly vulnerable to severe stressors such as war and terrorism
Research also suggests that adolescents with depressed parents are more sensitive to stressful
events; these adolescents are also more likely to have problems with depression themselves
after experiencing stressful life events than those who do not have depressed parents
Individual characteristics that have been identified as improving a person’s ability to handle life
stress include higher levels of optimism, greater psychological control or mastery, increased self-
esteem, and better social support
A major development in stress research was the discovery that a particular form of a particular
gene (the 5HTTLPR gene) was linked to how likely it was that people would become depressed
in the face of life stress.
The amount of stress we experience early in life may also make us more sensitive to stress later
on. The effects of stress may be cumulative, with each stressful experience serving to make the
system more reactive.
, Stressful experiences may also create a self-perpetuating cycle by changing how we think about,
or appraise, the things that happen to us. Studies have shown that stressful situations may be
related to or intensified by a person’s cognitions.
The term stress tolerance refers to a person’s ability to withstand stress without becoming
seriously impaired.
Stressor: environmental events that may be judged as threatening or demanding that initiates
stress.
Characteristics of Stressors
The key factors involve
the severity of the stressor, Stressors that involve the more important aspects of a person’s life
—such as the death of a loved one, a divorce, a job loss, a serious illness, or negative social
exchanges—tend to be highly stressful for most people (Aldwin, 2007; Newsom et al., 2008).
its chronicity (i.e., how long it lasts), Furthermore, the longer a stressor operates, the more
severe its effects. A person may be frustrated in a boring and unrewarding job from which there
is seemingly no escape, suffer for years in an unhappy and conflict-filled marriage, or be severely
frustrated by a physical limitation or a long-term health problem.
its timing, Encountering a number of stressors at the same time also makes a difference. If a
man loses his job, learns that his wife is seriously ill, and receives news that his son has been
arrested for selling drugs, all at the same time, the resulting stress will be more severe than if
these events occurred separately and over an extended period.
how closely it affects our own lives, Symptoms of stress also intensify when a person is more
closely involved in an immediately traumatic situation. Learning that the uncle of a close friend
was injured in a car accident is not as stressful as being in an accident oneself.
how expected it is, Extensive research has shown that events that are unpredictable and
unanticipated (and for which no previously developed coping strategies are available) are likely
to place a person under severe stress. A devastating house fire and the damage it brings are not
occurrences with which anyone has learned to cope.
how controllable it is, Finally, with an uncontrollable stressor, there is no way to reduce its
impact, such as by escape or avoidance. In general, both people and animals are more stressed
by unpredictable and uncontrollable stressors than by stressors that are of equal physical
magnitude but are either predictable or controllable or both.
Coping strategies:
• Coping means to invest one’s own conscious effort to solve personal and interpersonal
problems in-order to try to master, minimize or tolerate stress and conflict.
• The psychological coping mechanisms are commonly termed as coping strategies or coping
skills. The term coping generally refers to adaptive (constructive) coping strategies.
