Stress and coping

Objectives

• Identify the basic elements of stress

• Identify events that cause stress

• Practice methods to reduce stress

• Evaluate defense mechanisms used to respond to stress

Emotions

• Feelings that involve physical and psychological changes• “Fight or Flight”• A physical response

to emotions related to a challenge or threat

Fight or Flight• Prepares body for

aggression (fight)

• Prepares the body to escape a perceived danger (flight)

• Learning to control emotions is a major task

Types of Emotions• Anxiety – a vague

unpleasant feeling that produces physical sensations.• Often causes tension

and increased heart rate.• Often cannot identify

the reasons for emotional distress.

Fear• Result of specific and

identifiable cause

• Physiological reactions similar to anxiety

Anger• Inborn, instinctive

• An emotional reaction to loss

Aggression• A combination of

frustration, hate, and/or rage.

Perceptions of Control• In control• The perception

that one has choices and is able to create a change in a psychological state or current life circumstances

Powerlessness• The perception that

one’s actions cannot effect changes in outcome.

• Long term feelings of powerlessness often lead to feelings of physical and mental fatigue which can lead to depression.

Hopelessness• The perception that

one’s needs have no potential of being met.

• Long term feelings of hopelessness can lead to depression.

Spiritual Distress• Leads to one

question.• The meaning of

life• The meaning of

suffering and pain• The value of

living.

Short Term spiritual distress is a type of personal introspection that promotes personal growth and development.

Prolonged spiritual distress leads to depression

Stress and Coping• Stress – the

subjective feeling of tension to perceived events.

• Coping – refers to how the mind deals with stress.

Coping mechanisms vary from person to person

• An event that stresses one person, might not be a stressor to another.

• Conscious behavior is usually based on the success of previous coping experiences.

Defense mechanisms• Unconscious, operate

automatically

Compensation

• Covering up weaknesses by emphasizing a more desirable trait or by overachievement in a more comfortable area. • For example a high school student too small to

play football might become a star tennis player

• Purpose- allows a person to overcome weakness and achieve success

Denial

• Is an attempt to ignore unacceptable realities by refusing to acknowledge them.

• For example: a mother, though told her daughter has terminal cancer, continues to plan for her daughter’s college entrance

• Purpose- temporarily isolates a person from the full impact of a traumatic situation.

Displacement

• Transferring emotional reactions from one object or person to another.

• For example: a b/f or g/f is arguing and he/she gets so upset that that slam their fist into a wall

• Purpose- allows feelings to be expressed at or through less meaningful objects or people.

Intellectualization

• When an emotional responses that would normally accompany a painful or uncomfortable incident is voided by use of academic or intellectual explanations that remove personal feelings from the incident.

• For example: pain over a best friends sudden death is reduced by saying, “ he wouldn’t have wanted to live and be disabled.”

• Purpose- protects a person from the emotional reality of loss.

Minimization

• Not acknowledging the significance of one’s behavior

• For example: a teenager says, “don’t believe everything my brother says, I wasn’t so drunk I couldn’t drive.”• Purpose- allows a person to decrease of

trivialize his or her own responsibility for their behavior

Projection

• Projects short comings or feelings onto others

• Example: a disgruntled college freshman, when called in to meet her advisor, believes that she is called on because the counselor doesn’t like her.

• Purpose- allows a person to deny the existence of shortcomings.

Rationalization

• Justification of certain behaviors with faulty logic and attribution of socially acceptable motive that did not, in fact, inspire the behavior.

• Example: a student cheats on an exam but blames the teacher for not making the material more understandable

• Purpose: helps a person cope with the inability to acknowledge inappropriate behavior.

Reaction Formation• An individual acts exactly the opposite of how he

or she feels

• Example: a teenager feels bitterness toward a girl who beat her out of a cheerleading position, but acts very sweetly and friendly when they see the other girl

• Purpose: a form of repression that allows feelings to be acted out in a more acceptable way (don’t be fake)

Regression• Resorting to an earlier stage of life that is

generally less demanding and responsible

• Example: an adult throws a temper tantrum when he can’t have his own way

(I call this the take your ball and go home syndrome)

Purpose: allows a person to return to a point in development when nurturing and dependency was acceptable

Repression• An unconscious mechanism by which

threatening thoughts, feelings and desires are kept from becoming conscious

• Example: a child who is verbally abused by her alcoholic mother cannot remember certain things about her childhood

• Purpose: protects a person from a traumatic experience until he or she has the resources of cope.

Effective coping mechanism

• A slight to moderate level of worry that engages adaptive activity to relieve mental distress.

Types of Behavior

• Maladaptive Behavior- a result of ineffective coping• Psychotic behavior- the most severe manifestation of

ineffective coping

• Caused by psychosis:• a state caused by lack of contact with reality• The mind unconsciously uses many defense

mechanisms to deny, destroy and avoid reality when it can’t consciously cope and solve problems.