Reading...
Play button
Play button
Use LEFT and RIGHT arrow keys to navigate between flashcards;
Use UP and DOWN arrow keys to flip the card;
H to show hint;
A reads text to speech;
73 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
|
What are two names for a field linking psychology to medicine?
|
behavioral medicine and health psychology
|
|
|
What are the psychological words that we call "stress"?
|
Stress is the process by which we respond to our environment; a stressor is something inducing stress, and a stress reaction is how we respond.
|
|
|
What ancient philosopher was interested in stress?
|
Hippocrates
|
|
|
Which psychologist did the first work on stress when?
|
Walter Cannon (1929)
|
|
|
What observation did Cannon make?
|
Emotions were aroused as epinephrine (adrenaline) is high, and subdued as norepinephrine (noradrenaline) is high, and stress causes epinephrine to be released.
|
|
|
What did Cannon label what the body does to respond to stress?
|
fight or flight
|
|
|
What does one's body do to respond to stress?
|
activates the sympathetic nervous system, which increases heart rate and respiration, diverts blood to skeletal muscles, and releases fat for the body to consume.
|
|
|
Which scientist expanded on Cannon's stress studies when?
|
Hans Selye (1936-76)
|
|
|
What are the two stress pathways?
|
release of adrenaline and of cortisol
|
|
|
How did Selye stumble upon his GAS?
|
He injected rats with hormone extract, but other liquids gave the same effect, and it occured to him that there was a general nonspecific reaction to these stressors.
|
|
|
What does GAS stand for?
|
general adaptation syndrome
|
|
|
How many phases does GAS have?
|
three
|
|
|
What is the first stage of GAS?
|
the alarm reaction, when the body mobilizes its resources
|
|
|
What is the second stage of GAS?
|
resistance, where your excitation levels remain high, and hormones are excreted
|
|
|
What is the third stage of GAS?
|
exhaustion, when you run out of resources, which can lead to illness or even death
|
|
|
What are the consequences of long-term stress?
|
a smaller hippocampus, so a loss of explicit memory, and overall physical deterioration
|
|
|
What are the three types of stressors?
|
catastrophes, significant life changes, and daily hassles
|
|
|
What is the first example of a catastrophe as a stressor?
|
LA 1994: Earthquake causes stress that led to 5 times more sudden-death heart attacks.
|
|
|
What is the second example of a catastrophe as a stressor?
|
Scottish police officers sent to patrol a disaster zone where a jet crashed saw 38% more short illnesses.
|
|
|
What is the third example of a catastrophe as a stressor?
|
Chernobyl, which rained down on Belarus, tripled stress-related illnesses for those that stayed and those that left.
|
|
|
What is the average increase in psychological disorders following a catastrophe, and who researched this when?
|
17%, as Anthony Rubonis and Leonard Bickman found in 1991
|
|
|
What did Baum and Fleming find when?
|
Three Mile Island produced stress symptoms, despite nothing actually happening (1993).
|
|
|
What did Williams and Berry find when?
|
Moving from one's homeland causes stress (1991).
|
|
|
What are the two ways psychologists study the effects of significant life changes on individuals?
|
They track individuals as case studies, or they interview people who get illnesses as to recent life changes.
|
|
|
What can alter which life changes affect us?
|
how we think about them, mainly positively not affecting us and negatively making it a stressor
|
|
|
How many people (and what research shows this) experience great stress each week?
|
60%, according to Harris 1987
|
|
|
What research points to everyday struggles as the main source of stress?
|
Kohn and Macdonald 1992, Lazarus 1990, and Ruffin 1993
|
|
|
What happened in Russia following the collapse of socialism?
|
divorce, murder, suicide, and stress-related illness went up, and life expectancy of Russian men went down almost 5 years.
|
|
|
Whose research looked at Russia between 1990 and 1993?
|
Holden 1996
|
|
|
What did Henry and Stephens (1977) find?
|
People who live a peaceful, monastic life have low risk of heart attack.
|
|
|
What causes burnout?
|
persistent hassles on a daily basis
|
|
|
What is burnout?
|
mental, physical, and emotional exhaustion
|
|
|
What are the effects of burnout?
|
fatigue, depression, and cynicism
|
|
|
What can alter which negatively-perceived life changes affect us?
|
whether we can control them or not: If we can, they don't affect us.
|
|
|
What did Laudenslager and Reite (1984) research?
|
They tested three rats, a control, a rat who had control over its shocks, and a rat who did not. Only the rat without control developed ulcers.
|
|
|
What research supports loss of control leading to illness?
|
Rodin 1986: Elderly home patients with little control decline and die sooner than those who have greater perceived control.
O'Neill 1993: Workers given control over their work environments have less stress. |
|
|
What roles to optimism and pessimism play?
|
Optimists are less vulnerable to stress.
|
|
|
What research supports optimism reducing stress?
|
Michael Scheier and Charles Carver 1992: Student optimists had lower blood pressure. Everson et al 1996: Finnish pessimists had heart attacks and died more than twice as often in a 10 year span.
|
|
|
Why do loss of control and pessimism increase stress?
|
They lead to outpourings of stress hormones.
|
|
|
What are 6 behavioral factors that increase the likelihood of coronary heart disease?
|
smoking, obesity, high-fat diet, physical inactivity, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol
|
|
|
Who discovered the role stress plays in coronary heart disease when?
|
cardiologists Meyer Friedman, Ray Rosenman, and others
|
|
|
What is a Type A personality?
|
competitive, hard-driving, impatient, verbally aggressive, and anger-prone
|
|
|
What is a Type B personality?
|
easygoing and relaxed
|
|
|
About what fraction of the population is Type B?
|
1/2
|
|
|
What did Friedman and Rosenman discover?
|
Type A personalities suffered 69% of heart attacks (of 257 men), and no pure Type B's had any.
|
|
|
Why are Type A personalities more prone to heart attacks?
|
They smoke more, sleep less, drink more caffeine, produce lots of hormones, which cause atherosclerosis.
|
|
|
What is atherosclerosis?
|
hardening of the arteries, due to the buildup of plaques
|
|
|
What causes problems, according to recent research, for Type A's?
|
negative emotions like anger and depression
|
|
|
What are psychologically caused physical symptoms called?
|
formerly psychosomatic, now psychophysiological
|
|
|
How does psychology cause physical illness?
|
The nervous and endocrine systems affect the immune system.
|
|
|
What is another name for white blood cells?
|
lymphocytes
|
|
|
What are the two types of white blood cells and where are they derived from?
|
B lymphocytes, which develop in bone marrow, and T lymphocytes, which develop in the thymus
|
|
|
What are the two ways the immune system can mess up?
|
by responding too strongly, attacking its own cells, causing arthritis or allergies, or by responding too passively, allowing pathogens or cancer to spread
|
|
|
What happens to the immune system under stress?
|
It is weakened.
|
|
|
Why does stress weaken the immune system?
|
It diverts energy to muscles and the brain and away from the immune system.
|
|
|
What factors can increase susceptibility to cancer?
|
stress and negative emotions like depression
|
|
|
Can hope slow cancer?
|
Yes, as indicated by David Spiegel and others from the Stanford University Medical School.
|
|
|
What are four cautions about psychology influencing disease?
|
It can lead the ill to lose self-esteem or the healthy to blame the ill for their illness. Also, emotions do not create cancer or disease, and some susceptibility is inherited.
|
|
|
Can conditioning influence the immune system?
|
Yes, as Robert Ader and Nicholas Cohen found with sweetened water in rats.
|
|
|
Why does stress have negatives?
|
because it gives immediate help, allowing us to conquer our troubles
|
|
|
What four categories make up stress management?
|
aerobic exercise, biofeedback, relaxation, and social support
|
|
|
What is one experiment supporting the use of aerobic exercise in reducing stress?
|
Lisa McCann and David Holmes 1984: Exercise treatment reduces depression more than relaxation exercises, while doing nothing changed nothing.
|
|
|
Why does aerobic exercise alleviate stress?
|
It strengthens the heart, lowers blood pressure, increases production of norepinephrine, serotonin, and endorphins.
|
|
|
What are three studies that show exercise improves health?
|
Paffenbarger et al 1986: Over 16 years, Harvard alumni who exercised were found to live longer. Anderson and Jose 1987: Of 15k Control Data Corporation employees, exercisers spent only 3/4 hospital time spent by non-exercisers. Powell et al 1987: Active adults get 1/2 the heart attacks of inactive adults.
|
|
|
What is biofeedback?
|
"a system of recording, amplifying, and feeding back information about subtle physiological differences"
|
|
|
Does biofeedback work to reduce stress?
|
a bit; the initial claims were overblown, but it does work best for tension headaches
|
|
|
Who studied whether meditation can reduce stress?
|
cardiologist Herbert Benson
|
|
|
What study is powerful evidence in favor of meditation as helping health?
|
Alexander et al 1989: elderly home residents given meditation therapy survived 3 years, while 1/4 of the nonmeditators died.
|
|
|
What evidence supports the claim that changing life-styles can reduce recurrent heart attacks?
|
Meyer Friedman et al 1978-81: Heart attack victims given life-style modification advice had half as many heart attacks as those given traditional advice.
|
|
|
What role does humor play?
|
It causes laughter, which arouses us, massages our muscles, and relaxes us.
|
|
|
When do relationships cause the most stress?
|
in crowded conditions lacking privacy
|
|
|
Overall, does family cause stress or reduce stress?
|
It makes us happier and healthier.
|
|
|
Why can relationships help us to cope with stress?
|
They can bolster self-esteem, push us away from negative habits, reassure us, calm us, and let us talk about our feelings.
|
