Psychology 0f Personal Effectiveness All You Need To Know About How To Live Happily & Effectively Timothy W. Starke

1. Psychology 0f Personal EffectivenessAll You Need To Know About How To Live Happily & EffectivelyTimothy W. Starkey, Ph.D., ABAP After Dinner Stress • Miami Dade College • Psyc CLP 1006 • Hialeah Campus • Room 1217 • M/W • 4:00-5:30 AM • Oct. 1- Dec. 19 (2007) • 305-279-0758 (Home) or 305-338-1615 (Cell) Hours 3:00 to 4:00 PM On M/W

2. Stress Mastery vs. Stress Management • “Stress management” refers to just managing your stress in order to “survive” it. • “Stress mastery” refers to doing more than just surviving the stress. It implies overcoming it in such as way as to actually “thrive” from stress. You’ve all seen some people who seem to be at their best when they’re working under very stressful conditions. These are people who have learned to utilize the stressful experience to grow from the experience. • “Stress mastery” is a learned skill; nobody’s born with it (as far as we know so far, anyway). It isn’t a mechanical or rote memory kind of thing. • “Stress mastery” is essentially learning how to cultivate wisdom

3. Stress Management vs. Stress Mastery

4. Definition of Stress • Stress is anything that requires an adaptive response on the part of the organism. Anything that requires you to make a change or adjustment is stressful to some degree. • Stress is an inescapable part of life. A Canadian scientist (Hans Seyle, who spent much of his life studying stress) once said “stress is the spice of life”. At times, though, we might wish that or lives were a little less spicy. • Seyle differentiated between two types of stress: positive stress (“Eustress”) and negative stress (“Distress”). Clearly, Seyle didn’t feel that stress was all bad. • In one of his stress studies, adult volunteers who were placed in a completely stress-free environment (a sightless, soundless, weightless, motionless liquid heated to body temperature) soon began to show disturbances of mood, thought, action (e.g. they got upset).

5. Definition of Stress (Cont’d) • OK, what criticisms of Seyle’s experiment would you make? What assumptions is it based on that might be questionable? • Other studies show that many tasks are performed better when the individual is under moderate levels of arousal. This relationship is known as the Yerkes-Dodson Law. Probably most tasks that are challenging are performed best when the individual is feeling a little anticipatory anxiety about it (e.g. giving a speech to the class). {Next time I teach my course in “Group Dynamics, take it and learn precisely how “anxiety/stress level” helps or hinders different types of performance, and what you can do about it.} • Do you agree with the equating of (physiological) “arousal level” with “stress level”? Or is it stretching it a little?

13. Negative Effects of Stress • Studies have shown that excessive/prolonged stress negatively affects your physical, psychological, and occupational functioning. • The relationship between stress and your health is not simple, and is not yet completely know. The impact of stress on your health is mediated by a variety of personality and age variables, as well as your genetic makeup and environment. • Nonetheless, it is clear from the studies of stress upon health that under prolonged stress your immune system can be weakened, creating vulnerability to illness and bodily system breakdown. • Chronic high levels of stress hormones (glucocorticoids) cause white blood cells to migrate to the bone marrow and hide out, making them less available for combating disease. • Some studies have reported that persons who have recently suffered a major life crisis are more likely to develop cancer.

14. 80% of all visits to doctors’ offices are for stress related disorders • At least 50% of all deaths in the U.S. are caused by cardiovascular diseases such as heart disease and stroke, in which stress plays a significant contributing role. • Most heart attacks occur around 9:00 AM on Monday mornings. • Cholesterol levels in the bloodstream rise during periods of stress. • Recent studies indicate that stress plays a significant role in the development of osteoporosis in women due to increased stress hormones. • Dentists report that a high percentage of patients show signs of nocturnal bruxing (teeth grinding at night). • Studies show that during college exam week students possess lower levels of salivary immunoglobulin, a defense against respiratory infections.

16. Psychological Consequences of Stress • Stress is a key factor in the development of emotional and behavioral problems. • Studies have identified stress as a major factor in the development of anxiety, phobias, panic disorders, depression, PTSD, obsessions, compulsions, and all major psychiatric disorders. • According to the WHO, depression (clearly a stress-related condition) is the number one cause of disability world-wide. • There are over 30 million Americans suffering from insomnia. Sales of sedatives are second only to those of aspirin. • An estimated 24 million Americans are using medications to cope with stress. The three best-selling medications in the U.S. are Tagamet (ulcers), Inderal (hypertension), and Xanax (anxiety). • Alcoholism is the 3rd leading cause of death in the U.S. Relief from stress and anxiety is a primary motive for abuse of alcohol.

17. Physiology of Stress • The “fight or flight” response is a physiological mechanism that enables to survive life-threatening situations. It is innate, and is not learned. For our species, it was a necessary evolutionary development to allow our survival. • “Fight or flight” involves the hyperactivity of the autonomic nervous system. Nature intended for it to go on for short periods only, however. After the danger is over, the autonomic nervous system returns to its normal balance (homeostasis). • Today, however, we do not face the same type of environmental dangers that our distant ancestors did (e.g. tigers). We face stressors that are impossible to either fight or flee, and the period of hyperactive autonomic arousal continues for long periods of time. • This results in the decline of the immune system and the eventual development of different kinds of psychosomatic illness. It can ultimately result in death. • The “General Adaptation Syndrome” (GAS) refers to 1. An alarm reaction (fight or flight), 2. Stage of resistance (habituation to the stressors), 3. Exhaustion (in which prolonged stress has overwhelmed our ability to cope)

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