Life Changes

• Life changes are significant and infrequent events in somebody's life that cause stress by using psychological energy to adapt EG marriage, divorce, death of a relative
• stress caused by life changes can be cumulative as they jointly cause more stress by taking additional energy to adapt
• both positive and negative life changes can contribute to stress
• Holmes and Rahe (1967) created the social readjustment rating scale (SRRS) which measures stress by assigning life change units (LCUs) to determine how much adjustment it requires and therefore how much stress it causes
• The baseline for life change units (LCU) on the social readjustment rating scale (SRRS) (Holmes and Rahe 1967) is marriage with 50 LCUs, while divorce has 73 LCU, and the death of a close friend has 37 LCU
• The social readjustment Rating scale (SRRS) (Holmes and Rahe 1967) uses retrospective self-report data as participants recall from a checklist all life changes they have experienced over the previous 12 months, this is usually then correlated with illness experienced over the same period of time
• Rahe (1972) found people with under 150 life change units (LCU) on the social readjustment rating scale (SRRS) (Holmes and Rahe 1967) experienced reasonably good health
• Rahe (1972) found 50% of people with 150-300 life change units (LCU) on the social readjustment rating scale (SRRS) (Holmes and Rahe 1972) experienced illness in the 12 months leading up to the study
• Rahe (1972) found 80% of participants who experienced over 300 life change units (LCU) on the social readjustment rating scale (SRRS) (Holmes and Rahe 1972) experienced illness in the 12 months leading up to the study
• Rahe (1970) conducted a prospective study which measured life change units and illness in participants during the following year
• Rahe (1970) used a sample of US Navy personnel assigned to one of 3 different aircraft carriers
• Rahe (1970) had participants complete the schedule of recent experiences (a form of social readjustment rating scale Holmes and Rahe 1967) 6 months before their placement to measure their Life change unit (LCU) scores
• Rahe (1970) had medical staff on the aircraft carriers record all illness in the participants during their placement to establish an illness score
• Rahe (1970) made none of the personnel or medical staff on the aircraft carrier aware of the aims or purpose of the study
• Rahe (1970) weakness; Ethical issues of deception as no participants were made aware of the aims of the study
• Rahe (1970) found a significant correlation between high life change units (LCU) and illness during placement
• Life changes strength; research support from Rahe (1970) who found a positive correlation between high life change unit (LCU) scores and illness in US military personnel HOWEVER this research was only correlational meaning there could be a third variable at play
• Life changes strength; Lietzen (2011) used secondary data from the health and social support study in Finland and found high life change unit (LCU) score correlated with the onset of asthma showing that stress causes stress related illness across multiple cultures showing the theory is not culturally biased HOWEVER this study is only correlational and does not show cause and effect
• Life changes weakness; some psychologists such as Lazarus (1980) would argue daily hassles are a bigger contributor to stress than life changes as they are more minor but are more frequent and are therefore cumulative
• Life changes weakness; not individualistic as it does not consider how similar life changes can vary depending on who is experiencing them for example during the death of a loved one, how close that loved one is or the individuals hardiness (Kobasa 1979) as it can make them more resistent to the stress that life changes present
• Life changes weakness; positive and negative life changes are both measured by the Social readjustment rating scale (SRRS Holmes and Rahe 1967) without considering the cause for the life change, for example moving house can be a positive life change if done through choice, however this could be involuntary due to financial hardship which would likely increase the stress the individual faces
• Life changes weakness; Turner and Wheaton (1995) found that participants did not find that life change generally contributed to stress but rather negative life change showing that positive life changes are over estimated by the social readjustment rating scale (SRRS Holmes and Rahe 1967)
• life changes weakness; methods of measuring life change such as the social readjustment rating scale (SRRS Holmes and Rahe 1967) are often retrospective and rely on self report leaving them open to social desirability bias as stress can distort memory when gathering retrospective data