Chapter 14 psychology

• Stress


  A process whereby an individual perceives and responds to events that they appraise as overwhelming or threatening to their well-being
• Primary appraisal


  Judgment about the degree of potential harm or threat to well-being that a stressor might entail
• Secondary appraisal


  Judgment of the options available to cope with a stressor, as well as perceptions of how effective such options will be
• Eustress


  A good kind of stress associated with positive feelings, optimal health, and performance
• Chronic stressors


  • Events that persist over an extended period of time (e.g. caring for a parent with dementia, long-term unemployment, imprisonment)
• Distress


  Excessive and debilitating stress that leads to fatigue, exhaustion, and declining performance
• Acute stressors


  • Brief focal events that continue to be experienced as overwhelming well after the event has ended (e.g. falling on an icy sidewalk and breaking a leg)
• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)


  A chronic stress reaction characterized by intrusive and painful memories, jumpiness, negative emotional states, detachment, angry outbursts, and avoidance of reminders of the event
• Life changes


  Events or situations that require a person to make changes in their ongoing life and adjust to those changes (e.g. death of a family member, marriage, divorce, moving)
• Social Readjustment Rating Scale (SRRS)


  A scale developed by Holmes and Rahe to examine the link between life stressors and physical illness, consisting of 43 life events that require varying degrees of personal readjustment
• Life change units (LCUs)


  Numerical scores ranging from 11 to 100 representing the perceived magnitude of life change each event on the SRRS entails
• Criticisms of the SRRS

  • Items are vague
  • Assumption that undesirable life events are no more stressful than desirable ones
  • Does not consider respondents' appraisals of the life events
• Daily hassles


  Minor irritations and annoyances that are part of everyday life (e.g. rush hour traffic, lost keys, obnoxious coworkers, inclement weather, arguments with friends)
• Health psychology


  A subfield of psychology devoted to understanding the importance of psychological influences on health, illness, and how people respond when they become ill
• Walter Cannon


  An eminent American physiologist at Harvard Medical School who was the first to identify the body's physiological reactions to stress
• Fight-or-flight response


  The nervous system's sympathetic response to a significant stressor
• Homeostasis


  An internal environment in which physiological variables such as blood pressure, respiration, digestion, and temperature are stabilized at levels optimal for survival
• Hans Selye


  One of the world's foremost experts in the study of stress
• General adaptation syndrome


  The body's nonspecific physiological response to stress
• Job strain


  A work situation that combines excessive job demands and workload with little discretion in decision making or job control
• Alarm reaction


  The body's immediate reaction upon facing a threatening situation or emergency, roughly analogous to the fight-or-flight response
• Stage of resistance


  The initial shock of alarm reaction has worn off and the body has adapted to the stressor
• Job burnout


  A general sense of emotional exhaustion and cynicism in relation to one's job
• Sympathetic nervous system


  One of the two systems involved in the physiological mechanisms of stress, triggering arousal via the release of adrenaline from the adrenal glands
• Hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis


  The other system involved in the physiological mechanisms of stress, working more slowly than the sympathetic nervous system
• Cortisol


  A stress hormone that can have harmful effects when released at sustained elevated levels, such as weakening the immune system