Stress and Health - 1544 Words

Stress and Health Psychology Andrew Arnold March 25, 2010 Ever wonder about how stress affects our bodies and our health? This word stress is thrown around by the media so much it’s losing its meaning but have you ever wondered how they define stress? The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines stress as a physical, chemical, or emotional factor that causes bodily or mental tension and may be a factor in disease causation. Our text book defines stress as the term used to describe the physical, emotional, cognitive, and behavioral responses to events that are appraised as threatening or challenging. Stress-causing events are called stressors, they can come from external sources or from within us and can scale from relatively mild to†¦show more content†¦Believe it or not there are such things as good and bad stress. Too much of either can lead to disorders that can control our lives and can help spiral our lives out of control. These disorders can possibly, in a sense, make us do things that we normally wouldn’t do. It’s almost like an altered uncontrollable state of both mind and body. One of those stress disorders is called acute stress disorder. Acute Stress Disorder, or ASD, is characterized by the development of severe anxiety, dissociative, and other symptoms that occurs within one month after exposure to an extreme traumatic stressor. This disorder was unfortunately the most common suffered by many people after the traumatic events of 9/11. Another stress disorder that is commonly found among returning soldiers from war is called post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a disorder that can develop following a traumatic event that threatens your safety or makes you feel helpless. Traumatic events that can lead to PTSD include rape, a natural disaster, kidnapping, assaults, car or plane crash, medical procedures especially in young children, and war. According to The National Institute of Mental Health, women seem to be more susceptible to PTSD and have almost twice the risk of developing PTSD. It’s easy to talk about the major life changes and major stressors but the most of our daily stress come from the smallest things. From minorShow MoreRelatedStress : Stress And Health1336 Words   |  6 Pages Stress and health might seem like two very different things but they are actually very alike. Stress can influence someone’s health such as the way our body reacts or adapts to the stressful situation. Chapter 12 states that stress can lead to health issues such as suppression of the immune system and cardiovascular wear and tear. Stress can play a huge role in our health and this essay will answer some of the stress questions such as three things that stress me out, a stressful situation in myRead MoreStress And Health : Stress1627 Words   |  7 Pages Stress and Health J Dugger Stress and Health. How does it effect you? 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This works explore the contribution of stress on health status. Related Research Statement of Purpose The purpose of this study is to highlight the depth to which stress affects physical and emotionalRead MoreStress And Its Effects On Health1442 Words   |  6 PagesIntroduction Stress is one of the most common and well-known risk factors trivializing one’s health. Given how fast paced modern life is, this makes stress unavoidable. Stress is a negative emotional response, which is accompanied by biological, physiological, psychological, and emotional changes in the body. Stress causes sympathetic activation of the hypothalamus which then acts on the adrenal cortex and releases the hormones cortisol and adrenaline. These two hormones create what is known asRead MoreStress And Health : Can Stress Affect A Person s Health? Essay1567 Words   |  7 Pages Stress and Health Can stress affect a person’s health? It’s a very good question. There have been a lot of studies done on the effects of stress on health. Stress comes in so many forms and can affect people differently. Some short-term types of stresses can actually benefit the immune system while other long-term types of stresses can be detrimental to it. The long-term types of stresses are what will be focused on. Learning how to deal with stress in better ways can help prevent the damageRead MoreThe Effects Of Stress On Health And Mental Health Essay1619 Words   |  7 PagesOvercoming Stress Have you seen a mental health expert about a mental health disorder, or were you diagnosed for such a condition? Most people will answer no even if they had a mental or emotional health issue in the past. Heath includes physical health and mental health, it’s not just physical. A lot of people hate to admit that they have mental disorder, and they might even refuse to seek a professional health care. It’s really important for people to take care of any emotional or mental issueRead MoreThe Effects Of Stress And Stress On Health And A Sound Life Essay1638 Words   |  7 PagesIntroduction Trauma and stress are part of everyone’s life. At some stage or later in life, individuals experience some situations that alter their life in a great deal. The term stress is used by many people, which describes some unusual events that change the behavior of a person towards a specific scenario. Many times, the term stress is used to describe the condition of the person which is inappropriate. While stress is an ongoing and part of everyday life, it is essential that every person learnsRead MoreHow Stress Affects Health987 Words   |  4 PagesHow Stress Affects Health Many health related issues can arise from being stressed out. Often times, stress can be positive, for example, exercise, or activities such as homework or other difficult tasks (Carlson, Eisenstat, and Ziporyn 2004). Although the tension can be stressful, certain tasks are beneficial to the mind or body, which is why it is positive stress. These activities can be stressful to one individual, but relaxing to another (Carlson, Eisenstat, and Ziporyn 2004). Negative stress