Hockenbury Discovering Psychology 5th txtbk

CONCEPTMAPSTRESS, HEALTH, AND COPINGStressNegative emotional state in response to events appraisedas taxing or exceeding a person’s resourcesHealth psychologists:• Study stress and other factorsthat influence health, illness,and treatment• Are guided by the biopsychosocialmodelStressors: Events or situations thatproduce stressRichard Lazarus (1922-2002)• Developed cognitive appraisalmodel of stress• Established importance of dailyhasslesLife events and change:• Life events approach: Stressorsare any events that requireadaptation.• Social Readjustment Rating Scalemeasures impact of life events.Social and cultural sources of stress:• Poverty, low social status, racism,and discrimination can causechronic stress.• Acculturative stress results fromthe pressure of adapting to a newculture.Daily hassles: Minor, everyday eventsthat annoy and upset peoplePhysical Effects of StressWalter Cannon (1871–1945)• Identified endocrine pathway involved inflight-or-fight response to acute stress.• Noted roles of sympathetic nervous systemand release of catecholamines bythe adrenal medulla.Psychoneuroimmunology studies interconnectionsof psychological processes, nervous andendocrine systems, and immune system.• Robert Ader (b. 1932) demonstrated immunesystem could be classically conditioned.• Janice Kiecolt-Glaser (b. 1951) showed thateveryday stressors affect immune systemfunctioning.Hans Selye (1907–1982)• Identified endocrine pathway in threestagegeneral adaptation syndromeresponse to prolonged stress.• Noted roles of hypothalamus, pituitarygland, and release of corticosteroids bythe adrenal cortex.