The Effects Of Stress On Mental Health

According to Janeway1, “stress is a physical or psychological stimulus which, when impinging upon an individual , produces strain or disequilibrium”.1 Stress is a biological, physiological and behavioural response to environmental demands. An appropriate amount of stress has protective and adaptive functions however a high amount of stress can cause pathological changes or even death.4 Exposure to stress can lead to painful emotions such as anxiety or depression, as well as physical illness.3 People under an overwhelming amount of stress may experience tachycardia, palpitations and rapid breathing.7

Society defines stress as anything which forces us to change. Through technical terms stress is defined as “a negative emotional state occurring in response to events that are perceived as taking or exceeding a person’s resources or ability to cope.” To explaining stress researchers came up with the “Cognitive appraisal model”, this system works to tell us whether we believe we have enough resources to deal with the situation without becoming stressed. For instance as a now college student those who have had previous experience taking finales in high school can have less stress than those who have not taken it. This is because they have previous experience with taking the tests and learning how to study while those who have never taken one can become extremely stressed over the unknown of the test. Stress is one of the sub branches that is attached to the world of health psychology. Health psychology is a quickly growing branch that deals with the way the mind and body work together. Psychologists that work in the health field came up with the biopsychosocial model. This model explains the complex interaction with biological, psychological, and social factors.

People are increasingly facing more stress since the Human-Being society became developed and complicated, by ignoring the physical influence to our body, Human’s health suffered considerably from stress. Many people was suggested to solve the stress problem by using psychological approaches, however, the research in recent decades has identified a significant awareness gap between the benefits of physical activities and stress relief. The following paper is aiming at exploring how stress affects physical health and how to relieve stress physically.

Stress can do incredible things to the human body, including helping us be more productive, work harder, or think faster. However, when a person experienced extreme stress in response to uncontrollable circumstances such as fighting in a war, a physical attack, an accident, or a natural disaster, it can be detrimental. A person who will live through a major traumatic event often could not cope with

Cases of mental illness in colleges are growing. There is a increasing number of students in colleges, and with that an increasing number of students developing a mental illness. The hypothesis is that first year students from low income and lower social statuses are developing serious mental illnesses as a result of the high demands of college course loads and as a result are relying on dangerous methods of coping. The project will focus on the following:

Stress usually occurs when your body perceives danger, whether that be from someone breaking into your house, a big essay that is due in the following days or even just an angry boss. There are three different kinds of stress, these include: acute, episodic and chronic. Acute is the most common type of stress because it is stress from every day things, such as something that arises from a terrifying or traumatic event. Acute stress can come from such simple things, such as a rollercoaster ride it can be stressful, yet exciting. Acute stress is usually considered the ‘healthy’ stress. Episodic stress is when acute stress is suffered too frequently, this usually happens when people make unrealistic demands for themselves which causes them to stress too much. Chronic stress is the opposite of acute stress, it is dangerous and unhealthy. Chronic stress usually occurs from things like a tragic death of a loved one, relationship troubles or traumatic experiences.

Existence of distinct links between psychological stressors and a persons’ overall health have been proven through various objective studies. The degree of the stress response can also be directly linked to the severity of its effects. Specific research indicates that stress is related to increased risk of improper immune system functioning, liver disease, and coronary artery disease.

Stress is any condition that seriously affects the balance of the organism physiologically and psychologically. Stress activates the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) releasing glucocorticoid hormones that produce generalized effects on different body systems including the nervous system (McEwen, 2008).

Explain some of the effects of stress on health and analyse the relationship between stress and personality

The expression "stress" can be applied in many ways. From a psychological perspective, stress can generally be discussed in relation to an imbalance between the demands of the situation encountered by an individual and the perceived ability to cope or adjust to these demands (Lazarus, 1991). Therefore, stress can have very beneficial results in term of mobilization of bodily resources to meet demands, but also detrimental effects when perceived demands exceed the individual's resources (McEwen, 2002). One of numerous stress responses is anxiety, referred to as a very unpleasant emotion which is evoked when the individual reviews a stressful situation as threatening or intimidating. Heightened levels of anxiety have been detected to have the

Stressful events can greatly impact an individual’s anxiety. As anxiety levels begin to increase, they affect different areas of the body, by increasing blood pressure, pulse rate and triggering perspiration. These processes can have both positive and negative results for the body, for instance memory can be enhanced or impaired. This outcome directly influences an individual’s ability to learn and retain new information. However, the effects stress has on memory depend on how long and when the individual experiences stress.

The impact of stress on the well-being of individuals has been well documented over time. This is more so the case when it comes to the effect of stress on an individual's psycho-socio-physical well-being. In addition to addressing how stress impacts on an individual's psycho-socio-physical well-being, I propose strategies that can be utilized to rein in on these stress factors. Further, I also propose activities which could come in handy as far as stress release is concerned.

Psychological stress is pressure placed on a person to adapt, cope, or adjust to a situation (Rathus, 2016, p.284). The result of prolonged stress can affect a person’s mood, pleasure experience, and have harmful effects on physical health (Rathus, 2016, p.284). Society in the twenty first century places high demands on people. Technology makes it very difficult to separate work life, school life, and home life. Today, society places a high value on a busy lifestyle for individuals. For example, many places of business are open twenty-four hours a day. In addition to societal pressures, attending a university adds to the stressors a person may experience. Going to school not only includes classroom time but it also includes homework,

Throughout my life, I have come to realize that work-life balance is essential to life satisfaction. However, with finals fast approaching, college students are studying harder, and stress levels are rising. Life satisfaction is a cognitive component of well-being and plays a significant role when decoding mental health concerns. To explore the relationship between stress and mental health, researchers Cahit Kaya, Timothy N. Tansey, and Macid Melekoglu administered a questionnaire based study to 235 college students in Turkey.

A substantial amount of Canadians experience stress in their lives. In fact, nearly one-quarter of the population over the age of 15 are stressed on a daily basis (Statistics Canada, 2013). Stress can be defined as a mental and emotional state of tension, in which one perceives the environment around them to be strenuous and overwhelming. Although some stress is necessary for survival, it can adversely affect both the physical and mental health. Its detrimental effects include but are not limited to: lack of confidence, concentration, motivation, decision making and increased heartrate, sweating, tension, as well as other physical and psychological problems such as headaches and insomnia (Canadian Mental Health Association, 2015). These health complications strongly emphasize the need for further research in ways to cope with, and reduce stress. Henceforth, the purpose of this paper is to use established research to better understand stress, then propose my own study that would investigate another stress-reduction method.