3.1 Types of Stress

Stress can be challenging to explain, because it means different things to different people. For example, going swimming might be stressful to some, but for others, it might be enjoyable. Stress affects our ability to relate to others because too much stress cause us to be irritable, which affects our communication skills. We will discuss more later on the effects of stress and human relations.

Hans SelyeThe American Institute of Stress, “Stress, Definition of Stress,” accessed February 15, 2012, http://www.stress.org/daily-life/ defined stress as the nonspecific response of the body to a demand for a change. In 1936, Selye researched this topic and discovered something surprising. When subjecting lab animals to acute but noxious physical and emotional stimuli—such as blaring light, loud noises, extreme heat or cold, or frustration—they all experienced the same physical symptoms of stress, such as the enlargement of the adrenal glands. He saw that these intense stresses over long periods of time caused other issues such as heart attacks, strokes, and kidney disease. His conclusion was that stress actually caused these conditions,The American Institute of Stress, “Stress, Definition of Stress,” accessed February 15, 2012, http://www.stress.org/daily-life/ not the stimuli themselves. Today, we usually define stress as the body’s way of responding to a demand. For example, if you are stuck in traffic and are going to be late for school, this may create stress. Having two tests in one day may cause stress as you try to find time to study for both. Likewise, you can feel stress in a difficult personal relationship with a family member or a significant other. Other definitions of stress include the internal reaction to a situation that could disturb a person’s well-being.

There are four types of stress. The first type of stress is called acute stress. This is the most common form of stress and normally comes from demands and pressures of the past and future.American Psychological Association, “Stress: The Different Kinds,” accessed February 15, 2012, http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/stress-kinds.aspx This kind of stress tends to be short term. For example, suppose you have a busy day. You have to drop your niece and nephew at school, stop by the post office, go to class, take a quiz, get an oil change, pick your niece and nephew up from school, drive home through traffic, and make dinner. A busy day such as this can create stress, but it is short term, because perhaps tomorrow you are less busy or are looking forward to the weekend where you don’t have as much to do. Every person experiences this kind of stress. Acute stress is a laundry list of the things we must do or a list of the things that didn’t go right. For example, if your car breaks down on the way to the post office, this creates a certain amount of acute stress, but once the car is fixed there is no stress associated with it.

Episodic acute stress is a more serious form of acute stress. In this type of stress, the person feels stress on a daily basis and rarely gets relief.American Psychological Association, “Stress: The Different Kinds,” accessed February 15, 2012, http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/stress-kinds.aspxUnlike acute stress, where there may be one or two busy, stressful days, episodic acute stress happens on a daily basis. The person who suffers from episodic acute stress feels stressed constantly with little relief. You have probably met these people. They may constantly complain about how much work they have and may be constantly late or always in a rush and may be anxious and irritable on a regular basis. Often, a person who suffers from this type of stress may have taken on too much and created self-imposed demands.

Chronic stress is the type of stress that happens month after month, year after year. This is long-term stress where people see little way out of a situation.American Psychological Association, “Stress Won’t Go Away?” accessed February 15, 2012, http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/chronic-stress.aspxSometimes, chronic stress begins with traumatic experiences such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) or childhood experiences. In others, chronic stress can occur in response to everyday stressors that are ignored or not managed well.American Psychological Association, “Understanding Chronic Stress,” accessed February 15, 2012, http://www.apa.org/helpcenter/understanding-chronic-stress.aspx For example, someone may have episodic acute stress, but over a long period of time, this can become chronic stress. With this type of stress, the person has given up looking for solutions to the stress and tends to just live with it. For example, consider a couple who is very unhappy in their relationship. While at one point in time in their relationship they may have experienced acute stress when arguing, this could have turned into episodic acute stress as the arguing occurred more frequently. Then when that type of stress was unrelieved for a long time, it became chronic stress. It becomes chronic because the couple took no steps to repair their relationship.

Sometimes life can make us feel as if we are burning a candle at both ends. The important thing to remember about stress is that it isn’t always bad. Eustress can help us be ready for challenges.

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We tend to think of all stress as negative, but as Seyle pointed out in his early research, some types of stress can actually cause us to challenge ourselves and work at a higher level.Laura Schenck, “Eustress vs Distress,” June 26, 2011, accessed February 15, 2012, http://www.mindfulnessmuse.com/stress-reduction/eustress-vs-distressFor example, if you want to run a marathon, at some point you may have to physically challenge yourself to keep running even when you are exhausted. This type of stress—positive stress to help us achieve at a higher level—is called eustress. It can motivate us to reach goals. For example, we may experience eustress before a job interview. This eustress can be positive if it helps us achieve success in the interview. Some people may view positive stress as negative stress and vice versa. For example, if I were told I needed to run a marathon, this would most definitely create negative stress for me. However, for others, this might be an enjoyable experience that generates eustress.

The Human Function Curve, originally developed by Peter Nixon, says there are different levels of stress that we may experience and our stress level affects our level of performance. He calls any state where we are awake and reacting to stimuli an arousal state, such as being at work. If we compare the amount of stress to our performance, our performance actually improves when we experience eustress. However, according to this model, there is a point where chronic stress can impede our performance. Looking at Figure 3.1 “The Human Function Curve”, you can see in the drone zone, for example, that our performance is low. We may be bored and not have enough positive stress for us to perform at a higher level. In the C zone, for example, we may experience eustress, which raises our performance. However, when we reach the fatigue zone, we could be experiencing chronic stress, which impedes our performance.

Another important thing to remember about stress is that it varies from one person to another. One person may feel intense acute stress when asked to give a speech in front of the class, while someone may feel eustress if asked to give the same speech. Likewise, it may take one person much longer—and more stress than another—to reach the C zone of performance. When dealing with stress, finding the ideal stress level—the one that creates eustress and gets you ready for challenges—is the goal.Hans Selye, “The Nature of Stress,” The International Institute of Stress, accessed February 15, 2012, http://www.icnr.com/articles/the-nature-of-stress.html

3.2 Symptoms of Stress

Our bodies go through a number of changes when we are faced with a stressor. From prehistoric times, physical changes in our body had to occur in order to prepare us to handle the stress. For example, we needed to be able to run fast to get away from something that could hurt us or we needed the energy to obtain food. This is called the fight or flight response. This concept was developed by Walter Cannon in the 1920s, and he believed that these reactions in the body enabled us to mobilize to deal with a stressful situation.Brian Luke Seaward, Managing Stress: Principles and Strategies (Jones and Bartlett Publishing), 6. More recent research has shown the addition of “freeze” to the response. This occurs when the fight or flight response didn’t work—or we were unable to react quickly enough to fight or flight, and we “play dead” or become immobilized. This response is as natural as fight or flight in our body chemistry. Consider the person attacked by a bear who plays dead and survives. The person couldn’t run (flight) and couldn’t effectively fight against the bear, so the freeze reaction (or the “do nothing,” play dead) reaction can sometimes work. We use the freeze reaction in response to stress triggers at work. For example, we can’t just leave (flight), as we typically need the job to pay our bills; it also may not be worth it to fight, so we freeze in response to the situation. Although this is an oversimplification of the body’s chemistry, it illustrates the point that the flight-fight-freeze response is actually a very prehistoric event. Today, even though our stresses may be different, our body still reacts the same way as it did in prehistoric times. To fully understand how stress impacts us, we need to understand how our bodies handles stress. When our brains initially perceive a threat, a few physiological effects, Figure 3.2 “Physiological Effects of Stress”, occur within each system of our bodies.

According to a survey of the American Psychological Association, 44 percent of Americans lie awake at night because of stress.American Psychological Association, “Stress in America: Our Health at Risk,” 2011, accessed February 16, 2012, http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/stress/2011/impact.aspx This is one example of how prolonged episodic stress can affect our personal life and our productivity at work. It is a positive thing for our body to get ready for acute stress. It prepares our body to perform at a higher level. However, long-term chronic stress or episodic acute stress can cause a variety of problems. Those problems are listed in Table 3.1 “Common Effects of Stress on Our Bodies, Moods, and Behaviors”.

In the 2011 American Psychological Association Stress survey,American Psychological Association, “Stress in America: Our Health at Risk,” 2011, accessed February 16, 2012, http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/stress/2011/impact.aspx 42 percent of Americans report anger as a result of stress, while 37 percent report fatigue as a result of stress. Lack of interest, motivation, and energy is reported by 35 percent of Americans. Digestion issues and changes in appetite are also reported. With these being fairly common occurrences, we can see the importance of learning how to manage stress. These symptoms can affect our ability to communicate well and be productive at work. If we do not get enough sleep, we lose interest and motivation and we are not our best at work, which can result in poor human relations with our coworkers, friends, and family. In Section 3.3 “Sources of Stress”, we will look at some possible causes of stress and discuss some of the ways we can learn to better handle stress.

3.3 Sources of Stress

3.4 Reducing Stress

We all experience stress at one time or another. However, we can take action to assess and relieve the stress in our life. First, we do some self-analysis to determine the stressors in our life and how we handle it. This emotional intelligence skill (self-awareness) allows us to see what we need to improve upon. Then, we can apply self-management tools to help us manage the stress in our lives. The benefit of this identification and management is that it allows us to relate better to others both in our work life and personal life.

Look at your habits and emotions and really think about what is causing the stress. For example, Julie may be stressed about a project due on Friday, but the real stress may be because she procrastinated in starting the project, and now there isn’t enough time to complete it. Or perhaps Gene is stressed because his personality type causes him to put too many things on his to-do list, and he isn’t able to get them done. Accepting responsibility for the role we play in our own stresses can be the first step in maintaining a life with mostly positive stress!

Next, we can look at the way we currently deal with stress. For example, when Emily is feeling stressed, she smokes a pack of cigarettes and tends to have several glasses of wine at night. When she isn’t stressed, she doesn’t smoke and may limit herself to just one or two glasses of wine every few days. Some people smoke marijuana or use other drugs to cope with the stress of everyday life. These substances seemingly help for a period of time but prevent us from actually dealing with the stress—and doesn’t help us to gain skills in self-awareness. Understanding your current coping mechanisms for stress can help you determine what works to manage stress—and what doesn’t.

Once we do some self-analysis, we can use a method called the four As. The four As gives us four choices for dealing with a stressor:

1. Avoid the stressor. We can try to avoid situations that stress us out. If watching certain television programs causes stress, stop watching them! Spend time with people who help you relax. We can also look at saying no more often if we do not have the time necessary to complete everything we are doing.
2. Alter the stressor. Another option in dealing with stress is to try to alter it, if you can’t avoid it. When changing a situation, you can be more assertive, manage time better, and communicate your own needs and wants better. For example, Karen can look at the things causing her stress, such as her home and school commitments; while she can’t change the workload, she can examine ways to avoid a heavy workload in the future. If Karen is stressed about the amount of homework she has and the fact that she needs to clean the house, asking for help from roommates, for example, can help alter the stressor. Often this involves the ability to communicate well.
3. Adapt to the stressor. If you are unable to avoid or change the stressor, getting comfortable with the stressor is a way to handle it. Creating your own coping mechanisms for the stress and learning to handle it can be an effective way to handle the stress. For example, we can try looking at stressful situations in a positive light, consider how important the stressor is in the long run, and adjust our standards of perfectionism.
4. Accept the stressor. Some stressors are unavoidable. We all have to go to work and manage our home life. So, learning to handle the things we cannot change by forgiving, developing tolerances, and letting going of those things we cannot control is also a way to deal with a stressor. For example, if your mother-in-law’s yearly visits and criticisms cause stress, obviously you are not able to avoid or alter the stress, but you can adapt to it and accept it. Since we cannot control another person, accepting the stressor and finding ways of dealing with it can help minimize some negative effects of the stress we may experience.

When your roommate borrowed your car without asking, you need to pick up a friend from the airport, and you have friends coming over for dinner—all on the same night, finding a way to reduce stress is important. Reducing stress for every person is going to be different. Being able to recognize what helps you personally reduce stress is an important part to a healthy work and home life. For example, exercising may be a great stress reducer for Duana, but for Lisa, finding time to exercise might cause more stress than the actual exercise helps!

Researchers have found the following activities cut stress significantly:Elizabeth Sboboda, “Feeling Frazzled? 8 Ways to Decrease Stress,” MSNBC, February 15, 2009, accessed February 22, 2012, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28719686/ns/health-behavior/t/feeling-frazzled-ways-decrease-stress/

• Meditating
• Listening to music
• Getting enough sleep
• Drinking black tea
• Spending time with a funny friend
• Pampering, such as a massage
• Doing something spiritual
• Chewing gum

Other ways to reduce stress might include the following:Jenny Kovacs Stamos, “Blissing Out,” WebMD, accessed February 22, 2012, http://www.webmd.com/balance/stress-management/features/blissing-out-10-relaxation-techniques-reduce-stress-spot

• Exercising
• Developing good time management skills
• Eating a healthy diet
• Organization such as keeping workspace organized
• Picturing yourself relaxed
• Breathing deeply
• Social interaction such as spending time with family and friends
• Positive thinking

As this chapter has addressed, stress can be a positive motivator in our lives, but too much stress can create human relations issues, productivity, and other serious health issues. By practicing self-awareness and then self-management, we can begin to realize those things that cause us stress and deal with them in a healthier manner.

3.5 Chapter Summary and Case