Psychological Stressors, Overview
278 Psychological Stressors, OverviewSee Also the Following ArticlesFreud, Sigmund; Psychotherapy.Further ReadingEllenberger, H. F. (1970). The discovery of the unconscious:the history and evolution of dynamic psychiatry. NewYork: Basic Books.Freud, S. (1953–1974). Civilization, its discontents (1930).In: Strachey, J. (ed.) Standard edition of the completePsychoanalytic Theorypsychological works of Sigmund Freud (vol. 21),pp. 59–105. London: Hogarth Press and the Institute ofPsychoanalysis.Freud, S. (1953–1974). The future of an illusion (1927). In:Strachey, J. (ed.) Standard edition of the completepsychological works of Sigmund Freud (vol. 21),pp. 3–56. London: Hogarth Press and the Institute ofPsychoanalysis.Roazen, P. (1975). Freud and his followers. New York:Knopf (Reprinted 1992, New York: Da Capo.).See: Psychoanalysis.Psychological Stressors, OverviewS M Monroe and G M SlavichUniversity of Oregon, Eugene, OR, USAã 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.This article is a revision of the previous edition article byS M Monroe, volume 3, pp 287–293, ã 2000, Elsevier Inc.Historical and General ConsiderationsConceptual ProgressMethodological Considerations and Recent euroendocrineNeurotransmitters, including epinephrine, norepinephrine, and dopamine,that promote sympathetic nervous system activity. They may be released insubstantial quantities during stressfultimes.Complex chemical compounds producedin the outer layer of the adrenal gland,which include both mineralocorticoidsand glucocorticoids. Mineralocorticoidsmaintain salt and fluid balance in thebody, while glucocorticoids have metabolic and anti-inflammatory effects andare important mediators of the stressresponse.Relating to the nervous and endocrine system, which produces endocrineStresssensitizationsecretions that help to control bodilymetabolic activity.The enhanced and progressive sensitivityof an organism to stress given repeatedexposure to stressors.Historical and General ConsiderationsHistorical MattersIt is frequently assumed that psychological stressorsare a concern of especially modern origins, or at leastthat they have become more prominent with recentadvances in society and technology. It is also commonlyassumed that with the accelerating progress of civilization, more and more people are afflicted with mentaland physical disorders. Historical accounts, however,suggest that such ideas about stressors, civilization, anddisease have been common for quite some time. SirClifford Albutt (1895: 217) expressed such sentimentsquite clearly well over 100 years ago:To turn now. . . to nervous disability, to hysteria. . . to thefrightfulness, the melancholy, the unrest due to living ata high pressure, the world of the railway, the pelting oftelegrams, the strife of business . . . surely, at any rate,these maladies or the causes of these maladies are morerife than they were in the days of our fathers?The tendency to view life in stressful terms may beeven more basic to human cognition than is readilyEncyclopedia of Stress, Second Edition (2007), vol. 3, pp. 278-284
Psychological Stressors, Overview 279apparent. The Greek myth of Sisyphus is enlighteningin this regard. The perpetual work of pushing a boulder up a mountain – only to have gravity bring it backdown after each and every effort – captures someof the qualities and characteristics linked to modernviews of psychological stressors. Perhaps there issomething fundamental about the human conditionand psyche that fosters a perception of the world as aplace rife with unrelenting demands that can never befully met, resulting in subjective states of fatigue anddistress and eventually leading to ill health. Each eramay bring its unique colorations to such perceptionsand its own attributions regarding their origins.It is against this psychological backdrop of beliefand possible bias in thinking that modern work onpsychological stressors must be examined. Psychological stressors and related concepts have been popularexplanatory constructs throughout recent, and perhaps not so recent, history. As a result of their subjective allure and apparent explanatory power, theseideas have often been loosely formulated. Owing toconceptual fuzziness and ambiguity, not only has progress in science been slowed, but nonscientific issues,ideas, and biases have been permitted to masqueradeas scientific truths.The concept of psychological stressors is rich withpossibilities for shedding light on important mattersin adaptation, dysfunction, and disease. The conceptis paralleled, though, by the potential pitfalls thataccompany its intuitive appeal. The challenge is totranslate the fertile ideas about psychological stressors into more precise concepts, definitions, and operational procedures. With more sound definitionaland methodological procedures in place, the utilityof stress concepts for understanding adaptationand maladaptation, mental and physical disorderand disease, will be better understood.Early Ideas and ResearchA broad foundation for understanding the organism’sreactions to challenging environmental circumstanceswas laid down by Claude Bernard and CharlesDarwin during the nineteenth century. Each of thesetwo influential individuals in his own way touched onissues deriving from the tension resulting from ongoing adaptation to changing and challenging environmental circumstances. Yet it was not until the early tomid-twentieth century that such generality and complexity began to be translated into more specific terminology and technology. These efforts can be tracedto at least three different lines of thought and research.The early work of Walter Cannon dealt with ideasabout common emotions and their physiologicalconsequences, particularly with respect to the body’smaintenance of homeostasis. This line of study wascomplemented shortly thereafter by the animal laboratory studies of Hans Selye, wherein acute and severe stressors were systematically investigated. It wasin Selye’s work that the concept of stress most forcefully emerged. Stress was defined as ‘‘the nonspecificresponse of the body to any demand’’ (Selye, 1976:74). Stressors, in turn, were defined as ‘‘that whichproduces stress’’ (Selye, 1976: 78). Finally, from another vantage point, Adolph Meyer popularized thelife chart methodology. This approach emphasizedthe importance of the dynamic interplay betweenbiological, psychological, and social factors, suchthat important events within the person’s biographybecame foci of attention for studying health anddisease. Collectively, these activities, and the multiplelines of research they generated, served to initiatespecific awareness of, and interest in, psychologicalstressors.Arising outside of the more purposeful activities ofscience was another influential development that contributed to the emerging idea that psychological stressors cause both mental and physical disorders. Priorto World War II, psychopathology was commonlyattributed to genetic factors or acquired biologicalpropensities; so-called normal people devoid of suchtaints were thought to be largely invulnerable to mental illness. The experiences during and after WorldWar II dramatically shifted thinking in medical andpsychiatric circles to incorporate the idea that severestress could precipitate breakdown in a previouslyhealthy individual. Once this conceptual shift began,it underscored the multiplicity of health consequencesthat could be caused by severe stressors. It also openedthe door for enlarging conceptual perspectives onpsychological stressors by considering how less severe, yet still noxious, aspects of the social and physical environment could contribute to, or precipitate,pathology.Conceptual ProgressUpon the foundations of stress research and theorylaid down by Selye, Cannon, and Meyer, along withthe influences of experiences of World War II, moderninquiry into the effects of psychological stressorsbecame a topic of increasing interest and, eventually,of extensive empirical inquiry. Two general themesmay be discerned that have underpinned advancesin theory: (1) characteristics of psychological stressors and (2) individual differences in response topsychological stressors.Stressor CharacteristicsDespite general agreement about the importanceof psychological stressors for health and well-being,Encyclopedia of Stress, Second Edition (2007), vol. 3, pp. 278-284
280 Psychological Stressors, Overviewdetermining exactly what it is about stressful circumstances that is deleterious has proven challenging. Aninitial question of considerable theoretical importance involved the basic nature of psychological stressors: are they best viewed in a unitary manner asnonspecific demands on the organism (as postulatedby Selye), or are psychological stressors more effectively viewed as a class of conditions harboringspecific component characteristics of importance?Investigators from two traditions – animal andhuman research – have addressed this issue, withparallel and sometimes intersecting developments.Although considerable progress has been made, thegeneral topic of elaborating stressor characteristicsremains one of central importance in current thinkingon psychological stressors.Animal Laboratory ResearchA great deal of work in the 1960s and 1970s wasperformed to determine whether specific psychological characteristics of stressors possess qualitativelydistinct implications for the organism. Initially thiswork revealed how particular features associatedwith the environmental stressors might be importantfor predicting adverse outcomes (as opposed to themore psychologically neutral notion proposed bySelye of general or nonspecific adaptive demands).Such research went on to probe the types of psychological stressors and their effects. It became of centralinterest to understand in a more differentiated waythe effects of diverse psychological stressors.Animal laboratory studies adopted ingenious designs to differentiate psychological components associated with environmental stressors, with the findingsfrom these studies demonstrating that distinctive psychological characteristics were responsible for manyimmediate behavioral or physiological responses. Forexample, specific psychological characteristics of stressors, such as undesirability or controllability, wereparticularly pertinent for the development of variousdisorders. It became clear, too, that other characteristics of stressors were important. For example, differentparameters of shock administration (acute, intermittent, or chronic) produced different physiologicaleffects in animals. Further, such differences might increase, decrease, or not influence the development ofparticular diseases. Finally, psychological stressors notonly could influence immediate psychobiological functioning, but also could have long-term ramificationsthrough permanent alteration of the organism.As the importance of specificity of stressor characteristics became more apparent and accepted, questions about the specificity of stress responses alsoarose. What were the implications of specific stressorcharacteristics for different facets of psychologicaland physiological functioning? Such theoreticaldevelopments greatly extended the framework forinquiry, requiring attention to multiple characteristicsof stressors in relation to multiple psychological andbiological processes and outcomes. Relatively simple,singular response indices (e.g., corticosteroids, catecholamines) were replaced by patterns of behavioraland biological effects or profiles of neuroendocrineresponses. More recently, other levels of conceptualization have been proposed. For example, psychological stressors may promote fundamental disruptions inoscillatory regulation of basic biological functions orreversions to earlier modes of functioning.Overall, research on psychological stressors fromanimal research has moved beyond unidimensionaland linear concepts of stressors and their effects.More recent thinking has adopted a larger frameworkfor understanding the diverse characteristics of stressors that influence particular and varied responsesystems of the organism. The response systems of interest have expanded from single systems to patternsor profiles of response across multiple indices.Human Experimental and Field StudiesInvestigators of psychological stressors in humansalso conducted innovative and insightful studies,both in the laboratory and in the field. Early worktended to focus on the aversive subjective attributes,particularly perception or appraisal, of psychologicalstressors as evaluated in an experimental setting. Yetat about this same time research on stressful lifeevents began. It is in this area of stress research thatactivity on psychological stressors perhaps reached itspinnacle, in terms of both productivity and popularinterest.Extrapolating from animal laboratory studies onthe one hand, and integrating with Meyer’s life chartprocedures on the other, Thomas Holmes andRichard Rahe first formulated the idea that distinctive changes in one’s life circumstances – specific anddocumentable life events – could be defined andassessed in an objective manner. The work was initially based on case histories of some 5000 tuberculosispatients, from which they derived a list of 43 lifeevents ‘‘empirically observed to occur just prior tothe time of onset of disease, including, for example,marriage, trouble with the boss, jail term, death ofspouse, change in sleeping habits, retirement, deathin the family, and vacation’’ (Holmes, 1978: 46).The Schedule of Recent Experiences (SRE) was developed and published, and by 1978 more than 1000publications had utilized this convenient method forEncyclopedia of Stress, Second Edition (2007), vol. 3, pp. 278-284
Psychological Stressors, Overview 281probing a vast range of questions pertaining to stressand illness.The common feature associated with these disparate life changes – the stressor characteristic of primary concern – was thought to be the degree of socialreadjustment entailed by the event: ‘‘The relative importance of each item is determined not by the item’sdesirability, by the emotions associated with the item,nor by the meaning of the item for the individual; itis the amount of change that we are studying andthe relationship of the amount of change to theonset of illness’’ (Holmes, 1978: 47). This viewpointis consonant with Selye’s ideas about stressors andstress. Hence, the psychologically neutral notionof the readjustment required of life changes was conceptualized as the characteristic responsible vulnerability to a wide variety of psychological and physicalmaladies.Much as the emphasis in animal laboratory studiesshifted from psychological neutral concepts of anydemand, viewpoints within the stressful life eventsliterature began to shift away from the concept ofreadjustment and toward emphasizing the undesirable characteristics of events. Human studies of lifeevents consequently began to focus on the particularcharacteristics of psychological stressors and theirpotentially unique effects. The principle of specificityalso was extended from the characteristics of stressors to the specific consequences of such experiences,elaborating theory about the importance of specificpsychological stressors for specific responses andeventually for specific types of disorder or disease.A vast literature on this topic has appeared over thepast two decades, with diverse conceptualizations ofpsychological stressors and myriad methods designedto measure them.The issue of desirability of events, however, alongwith the more general issue involving stressor characteristics, brought into focus another important subject in the study of psychological stressors: individualdifferences. What might be viewed or experienced asundesirable by one person could be viewed or experienced as desirable by another. As discussed next,a variety of considerations are invoked to explainvariability in effects and outcomes in relation topsychological stressors.Individual DifferencesDespite progress in conceptualizing the componentcharacteristics of psychological stressors, and despiteprogress in prediction afforded by such work, considerable variability in response to psychologicalstressors occurs. Even under the most dire of stressful conditions, all animals or individuals do notnecessarily break down. Although a refined understanding of stressor characteristics still may accountfor some variability in outcomes, other factors maybe useful to effectively model effects of psychologicalstressors. Progress in understanding this issue hasagain come from both the basic laboratory andhuman studies of psychological stressors.Animal Laboratory ResearchAlthough there were characteristic features of physiological responses to the stressors employed in theearly paradigm adopted by Selye, not all animalsresponded to stress in an identical manner. Further,individual differences in response were even morepronounced when the less severe types of stressorswere used.Such variables as prior experience, availability ofcoping responses, and other aspects of the social andexperimental context were found to moderate theinfluence of psychological stressors. For example,when rats are exposed to electric shock, animalsthat cannot predict shock occurrence (via warningtones) develop a sixfold increase in gastric ulcerationcompared to their yoked counterparts (who receivethe warning tones). Work along these lines demonstrated the delicate and often subtle interplay amongstressor, social context, and resources available to theorganism in determining response outcomes. Theselines of study, too, suggested that individual differences in susceptibility to psychological stress could beviewed within a developmental perspective in termsof stress sensitization. Laboratory animals repeatedlyexposed to severe psychological stressors can becomeneurobiologically sensitized to the stressors, such thatrelatively minor degrees of stress eventually acquirethe capability of triggering pathogenic responses.Human Life Stress ResearchThe importance of individual differences was perhapsmore apparent in studies of human life stress and itsconsequences. A consistent criticism of life eventsresearch was the relatively weak association betweenpsychological stressors and disorder. It was assumedthat other considerations moderated stress effects,and the elucidation of such factors would increasethe predictive capability of disorder following stressful events. Again, there were a number of factors thatwere believed to moderate the impact of psychological stressors, ranging from environmental factors suchas social support to more individual factors such asprior experience and coping. Developmental considerations have also been important in recent theorizing about individual differences in responsivity toEncyclopedia of Stress, Second Edition (2007), vol. 3, pp. 278-284
282 Psychological Stressors, Overviewpsychological stressors, with the idea that prior exposure to severe psychological stressors renders the individual more susceptible to increasingly lower levelsof psychological stress.A major arena for understanding individual differences in stress susceptibility has been perception. Theearly and elegant laboratory studies of human stresshad indicated the importance of such individual differences in perception, or appraisal, of stressors, andsuch thinking was readily incorporated into theoryand method. Studies of life events, for example, usedsubjective weights of events experienced by the studyparticipants. Once this avenue of inquiry was opened,it also brought to the forefront a variety of influenceson perception, along with other factors that mightinfluence stress responsivity. Thus, research began tofocus not only on appraisal of stressors, but also oncoping, social support, personality, and other considerations that in theory could moderate
the importance of the dynamic interplay between biological, psychological, and social factors, such that important events within the person’s biography became foci of attention for studying health and disease. Collectively, these activities, and the mult
2.1 Job Stress . Job stress is an experience of stress that an individual feels, but the source of stress is related to work or workplace (Firth et al.2004). Conte and Landy (2019) also explain the types of stressors in the workplace. Workplace stresses are classified into three types: physical stressors, task stressors, and psychological .
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LESSON PLAN PART 1: Highlight to the class that life is full of stressful experiences. We have different ways to deal with the stressors in our lives. One way is by managing the emotions that we feel in relation to these stressors. One of the ways that we deal with stressful experiences is to manage the emotions that we
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considered. Beyond having immediate effects on your well-being, stressful experiences can also mark you for decades. In fact, the stressors you encounter, depending on when they occurred and how severe they were, can have intergenerational effects. This chapter will introduce you
I am My Brother’s Keeper (2004) As our New Year’s celebration draws near, I once again find myself pondering the enigmatic story that our tradition places before us at this time—the story of the Binding of Isaac. Once again, I walk for those three long days with father Abraham and ponder the meaning of his journey with his son to the mountain. And once again, I find fresh meaning in the .
