Stress And Coping

• Stress is defined as “non- specific physiological response of the body to any demand upon it”.

• Stress has both physiological and psychological components

• Stressor: an environmental event or condition that results in stress.

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Physiologic & psychologic responses of stress

* Physiological component:

- Palms sweat.

-Increase heart rate.

- Neck and shoulder muscles tense.

-Headache.

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* Psychological component:

-Irritability

-Increase concentration.

-Hyper arousal.

-↓ memory and performance.

-Worry.

-Gets angry about little things.

-unpleasant thoughts and perceptions.

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Stages of stress:

1- Alarm reaction:

The initial emergency state.

stimulation of sympathetic nervous system, that release of adrenaline and nor-adrenaline, heart rate, muscle tension and dilation of the pupils.

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2- Resistance stage:

- Defensive reactions reach their limits of adaptation.

- If exposure to stress continues, body resources become depleted and resistance can’t be maintained.

3-Exhaustion stage:-

-Defenses failed, stress become overwhelming.

- If stress continues, Sever mental illness or death is possible .

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Types of stressors: 1- Major changes affecting large number of people and universally stressful:

- outside control such as, earthquakes, volcanoes, tornadoes , wars, torture, ethnic inequality.

2- Major disastrous events affecting only one or few persons, such as death of a loved one, major illness, & divorce.

3- Daily hassles: irritate and distress people as having too many responsibilities, feeling lonely or work overload

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Trauma, Grief, Mourning* Psychological trauma: seen as the reaction following the exposure to stressful overwhelming experience that is out of control and coping strategies are insufficient.

* Grief: subjective emotions and affect that are a normal response to the loss.

* Mourning: the outward expression of grief

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* Stages of grieve and mourning:

1. Denial:  

2. Anger:

3. Bargaining 

4. Depression:

5. Acceptance:

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• stressful person-environment relationships: and their immediate and long-term outcomes:

• 1- Cognitive appraisal:

a- Primary appraisal: the person evaluates if there is potential harm or benefit on self-esteem.

b- Secondary appraisal: the person evaluates what can be done to prevent or overcome harm.

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c- Reappraisal: incorporating new information that may increase or decrease level of stress.

2- Coping with stress:

- " Constantly changing cognitive and behavioral efforts to manage the internal and external demands that are appraised as exceeding the resources of the person" .

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Forms of Coping Strategies:

A) Problem focused coping:

- It is consisted of direct efforts to alter the demands on the person,

- It includes the following coping strategies:

 1. Confrontational coping:-

•fighting for what want. Ex: If you are fired from work, you need to know why you were fired and try do convince your boss change his mind.

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• Confronting is the best way to deal with stress (gathering information and taking action to solve the problem).

• People who deal with a problem directly are more likely to solve the problem & also are better prepared to handle future stress.

 

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• 2- Seeking for Instrumental support:

- Find out the needed information, and available resources to solve the problem.

3- Planned problem solving:

• Defining the problem, set & weighing alternative solutions, then selecting the most appropriate one.

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B) Emotional focused coping:

• Efforts to regulate the emotional consequences of a stressful situation. Positive or negative emotional strategies.

* Positive emotional focused strategies:

1- Accept responsibility:-

• Acknowledge that you brought this on yourself. 

2- Positive reappraisal:-

-Ex. reappraise getting fired as being the push you need to look for more interesting job.

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3- Venting of emotions:

- Expressing feelings verbally, or through crying, drawing or playing is very effective.

4- Seeking for social and emotional support:

• Turning to others for comfort and advice on how to hand the situation.

• feel with acceptance and empathy from family members, friends, therapist & other significant people.

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• Negative emotional focused strategies:

1- Self control:-

- Keeping your chin up and not letting your feelings show.

2- Distancing:-

- Make your self busy in other activities to take your mind off the problem.

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3- Escape / avoidance:

- Escaping through drugs, drinking or overeating. chronic avoidance may lead to related health problems (ulcers, hypertension).

C) Religious coping:

- Religion interlock in an individual's life and help him to deal with stresses in life.

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Factors mediating the response to stress

1. personality characteristics, cognitive abilities, believes, attitudes, ..etc.

2. Previous ways of coping.

3. Characteristics of the stressful situations.(nature ,severity, frequency and duration).

- Poor coping may result from sever life threatening stressors.

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4. parenting : predict child resilience and use of more adaptive coping strategies.

5. Locus of control.

6. Social support: emotional responsiveness, empathy, and communication

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Stress and physical illnessstrong correlation

1. Cardiovascular: as "MI", and "CVA".

2. Endocrine: as DM, and thyrotoxicosis.

3. Central nervous system: headache, and migraine.

4. Gastrointestinal tract: as ulcerative colitis and peptic ulcer.

5. Immune system: ↓immunoglobulin, lymphocytes.

6. Cancer. 20

Stress Management

1. Modify the stressful environment

2. Change the individual cognition.

3. Reduce stress by treating the individuals.

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Techniques in stress management A. Biofeedback: monitoring body physiological functions as heart rate, respiratory rate, blood pressure. ..etc. and learning to control them. *“Effective in the management of some conditions as migraine &essential hypertension”.

B. Relaxation techniques: decrease muscle tension. (relaxation techniques can be practiced at home using a tape recorded instructions).

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C. Meditation: the most effective ways of dealing with stress symptoms.

“It is a psychological form of relaxed concentration necessary for peak performance”.

*The ability to focus on a specific word or object.

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D. Exercise: swimming, walking, running etc. release tension and improve mood and general sense of well being and help decrease anxiety.

E. Group therapy: working with groups of similar back grounds.

“Clients gives each other support and exchange experiences can be helpful for some groups”.

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F. Cognitive-behavioral therapy: is used successfully to treat stress related disorders. *Positive reframing: means turning negative messages into positive messages.

 

H. Assertiveness training: helps the person take more control over life situations.

“THE END”

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