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Showing papers on "Stressor published in 2009"


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This overview demonstrates the role of age and gender, endogenous and exogenous sex steroid levels, pregnancy, lactation and breast-feeding, smoking, coffee and alcohol consumption as well as dietary energy supply in salivary cortisol responses to acute stress.

849 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Empirical support is examined for the role of individual-level coping strategies in buffering the impact of racism on specific health-related outcomes, including mental health, physical health, resting blood pressure levels, and cardiovascular reactivity to stressors.
Abstract: Racism is a stressor that contributes to racial/ethnic disparities in mental and physical health and to variations in these outcomes within racial and ethnic minority groups. The aim of this paper is to identify and discuss key issues in the study of individual-level strategies for coping with interpersonal racism. We begin with a discussion of the ways in which racism acts as a stressor and requires the mobilization of coping resources. Next, we examine available models for describing and conceptualizing strategies for coping with racism. Third, we discuss three major forms of coping: racial identity development, social support seeking and anger suppression and expression. We examine empirical support for the role of these coping strategies in buffering the impact of racism on specific health-related outcomes, including mental health (i.e., specifically, self-reported psychological distress and depressive symptoms), self-reported physical health, resting blood pressure levels, and cardiovascular reactivity to stressors. Careful examination of the effectiveness of individual-level coping strategies can guide future interventions on both the individual and community levels.

709 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Heightened physiological stress responses in typical adolescents may facilitate adaptation to new challenges of adolescence and adulthood and in high-risk adolescents, this normative shift may tip the balance toward stress response dysregulation associated with depression and other psychopathology.
Abstract: Little is known about normative variation in stress response over the adolescent transition. This study examined neuroendocrine and cardiovascular responses to performance and peer rejection stressors over the adolescent transition in a normative sample. Participants were 82 healthy children (ages 7-12 years, n = 39, 22 females) and adolescents (ages 13-17, n = 43, 20 females) recruited through community postings. Following a habituation session, participants completed a performance (public speaking, mental arithmetic, mirror tracing) or peer rejection (exclusion challenges) stress session. Salivary cortisol, salivary alpha amylase (sAA), systolic and diastolic blood pressure (SBP, DBP), and heart rate were measured throughout. Adolescents showed significantly greater cortisol, sAA, SBP, and DBP stress response relative to children. Developmental differences were most pronounced in the performance stress session for cortisol and DBP and in the peer rejection session for sAA and SBP. Heightened physiological stress responses in typical adolescents may facilitate adaptation to new challenges of adolescence and adulthood. In high-risk adolescents, this normative shift may tip the balance toward stress response dysregulation associated with depression and other psychopathology. Specificity of physiological response by stressor type highlights the importance of a multisystem approach to the psychobiology of stress and may also have implications for understanding trajectories to psychopathology.

525 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This paper reviews stressor paradigms used with infants, children, and adolescents to guide researchers in selecting effective stressor tasks and considers several factors, including the availability of coping resources and the extent to which, in older children, the task threatens the social self.

508 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Zuckerman and Gagne as discussed by the authors found that college women reported a higher overall level of stress and greater use of emotion-focused coping strategies than college men, while men and women also reported different coping strategies for different stressors.
Abstract: The sources of stress (academics, financial, family, social, and daily hassles) and coping strategies (self-help, approach, accommodation, avoidance, and self-punishment) of 166 college students were examined. The relationship between sex, specific sources of stress, and coping strategies was also investigated. Students completed a stress assessment inventory and a stress coping inventory based on a 5-factor revised COPE model (Zuckerman and Gagne Journal of Research in Personality, 37:169–204, 2003). Results found that college women reported a higher overall level of stress and greater use of emotion-focused coping strategies than college men. College men and women also reported different coping strategies for different stressors; however the use of emotion-focused coping strategies dominated over problem-solving strategies for both men and women. These results have implications for designing stress reduction workshops that build on the existing adaptive emotion-focused strategies of college students.

501 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Elevated stress levels can impede performance on tasks that require divided attention, working memory, retrieval of information from memory, and decision making, and medical educators might want to consider avenues for training learners in stress management.
Abstract: Purpose This paper is a review of representative research on the impact of acute stressors on the clinical performance of individuals and teams. Method The Sciences Citation Index, Medline, and Psychinfo were used to search for articles up to and including 2008. The search terms were stress/tension/arousal/ anxiety/cortisol/threat, cognition/skills/ memory/attention/problem solving/ decision making/performance, stress reduction/stress exposure/stress management/stress inoculation, and health professionals/medicine/medical students/residents/physicians/teams. The search was limited to papers in English from all developed countries. Secondary references were selected from primary papers. Results Elevated stress levels can impede performance on tasks that require divided attention, working memory, retrieval of information from memory, and decision making. These effects appear to be determined by the individual’s appraisal of the demands and resources of a situation, the relationship between the stressor and the task, and factors such as coping styles, locus of control, and social supports. Conclusions Given the potential negative impact of stress on performance, and the individualistic way in which people respond, medical educators might want to consider avenues for training learners in stress management. More research is needed to fully understand the contributions of personal factors such as coping style and locus of control, as well as the relationship of perceptions of stress to issues such as fatigue.

492 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Interventions that address modifiable stressors and promote effective coping and resiliency will probably be most beneficial in minimizing police stress and associated outcomes.
Abstract: This study estimates the effects of perceived work stress in police officers and determines the impact of coping on both perceived work stress and health. Officers from a large, urban police department (N = 1,072) completed detailed questionnaires. Exposure to critical incidents, workplace discrimination, lack of cooperation among coworkers, and job dissatisfaction correlated significantly with perceived work stress. Work stress was significantly associated with adverse outcomes, including depression and intimate partner abuse. Officers who relied on negative or avoidant coping mechanisms reported both higher levels of perceived work stress and adverse health outcomes. Results have implications for improving stress-reducing efforts among police officers. Interventions that address modifiable stressors and promote effective coping and resiliency will probably be most beneficial in minimizing police stress and associated outcomes.

373 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The relations between 4 sources of family stress and the emotion socialization practice of mothers' and fathers' responses to children's negative emotions were examined and suggest that measures ofFamily stress relate to supportive and nonsupportive parental responses, though many of these relations differ by parent gender.
Abstract: The relations between 4 sources of family stress (marital dissatisfaction, home chaos, parental depressive symptoms, and job role dissatisfaction) and the emotion socialization practice of mothers’ and fathers’ responses to children’s negative emotions were examined. Participants included 101 couples with 7-year-old children. Dyadic analyses were conducted using the Actor–Partner Interdependence Model and relations were tested in terms of the spillover, crossover, and compensatory hypotheses. Results suggest that measures of family stress relate to supportive and nonsupportive parental responses, though many of these relations differ by parent gender. The results are discussed in terms of the 3 theoretical hypotheses, all of which are supported to some degree depending on the family stressor examined.

322 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: There was a trend suggesting that increased acute stress is more strongly associated with depression in those with high versus low chronic stress, and the importance of including assessment of chronic stress in fully understanding the extent and mechanisms of stress–depression relationships is suggested.
Abstract: Background: This study explored the relatively neglected role of chronic stress in major depression, examining the independent contributions of co-occurring chronic and acute stress to depression, whether chronic stress predicts acute life events, and whether the two types of stress interact such that greater chronic stress confers greater sensitivity—or resistance—to the depressive effects of acute stressors. Methods: From a sample of 816 community women, those who had a major depression onset in the past 9 months and those without major depressive episodes (MDE) onset and with no history of current or recent dysthymic disorder were compared on interview-based measures of antecedent acute and chronic stress. Chronic stress interviews rated objective stress in multiple everyday role domains, and acute stress was evaluated with contextual threat interviews. Results: MDE onset was significantly associated with both chronic and acute stress; chronic stress was also associated with the occurrence of acute events, and there was a trend suggesting that increased acute stress is more strongly associated with depression in those with high versus low chronic stress. Conclusions: Results suggest the importance of including assessment of chronic stress in fully understanding the extent and mechanisms of stress–depression relationships. Depression and Anxiety, 2009. Published 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

274 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This commentary reviews and reflects on the studies of this special section: studies that collectively provide compelling evidence for meaningful changes in stress- and emotionally reactive psychophysiological systems with the transition from middle childhood into adolescence, with promising directions for future research.
Abstract: This commentary reviews and reflects on the studies of this special section: studies that collectively provide compelling evidence for meaningful changes in stress- and emotionally reactive psychophysiological systems with the transition from middle childhood into adolescence. The observed changes were complex and often overlaid upon ontogenetic differences in basal levels of activation of these systems. Maturational increases in responsiveness to stressors were stressor dependent and differentially expressed across autonomic and hormonal measures. Pubertal status increased the impact of some affective valence manipulations, although not significantly influencing others, including negative affect-related potentiation of startle/reflexes. Such ontogenetic increases in stressor and affect sensitivity may have implications for developmental psychopathology. Developmental increases in stressor reactivity may normally aid youth in responding adaptively to the challenges of adolescence, but may result in stress dysregulation among at-risk adolescents, increasing further their vulnerability for psychopathology. Pubertal-related increases in sensitivity to emotionally laden stimuli may exacerbate individual predispositions for exaggerated affective processing, perhaps contributing to the emergence of psychological disorders in these youth. Together, these studies, with their innovative use of autonomic, reflexive, and hormonal measures to index age- and pubertal-related changes in reactivity to stressors and affective stimuli, provide promising directions for future research. Some of these, along with a few cautionary notes, are outlined.

259 citations


Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Results are in line with previous studies indicating reduced reactivity of the autonomic nervous system to psychosocial stress in trained individuals and imply a differential effect of the level of physical activity on different stress-related neurophysiological systems in response to psychOSocial stress.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors used the challenge-hindrance framework to examine the discrete and combined effects of different environmental stressors on behavioral, cognitive, and affective outcomes at the team level.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Hong Kong baccalaureate nursing students' stress and their coping strategies in clinical practice showed that students perceived a moderate level of stress and transference was the most frequently used coping strategy.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Race (as a surface-level characteristic and as a deep-level identity) is proposed to explain emotional exhaustion, the primary burnout dimension, for service employees, and the centrality of minority employees' racial identity strengthened the association of customer incivility with emotional exhaustion because of increased stress appraisals.
Abstract: Experiencing frequent incivility from customers is a noted social stressor linked with job burnout. Race (as a surface-level characteristic and as a deep-level identity) is proposed to explain emotional exhaustion, the primary burnout dimension, for service employees. The authors did not find that "microaggressions" were more likely toward racial minorities, nor any difference in job-related exhaustion between racial minority (primarily African American) and nonminority (White) retail employees. However, the centrality of minority employees' racial identity strengthened the association of customer incivility with emotional exhaustion because of increased stress appraisals, consistent with the Group Identity Lens Model. Proposals for future research on workforce racial diversity are made.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The identification of regulatory gene networks that are stress activated, and modulated by cortisol, both in hepatic and extra-hepatic tissues, will provide a mechanistic framework to characterize the multifaceted role of cortisol during stress adaptation.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, a review of the behavioural disturbances associated with stressful/traumatic experiences (e.g., depression, anxiety, posttraumatic stress disorder, and substance abuse disorder) is presented, and the authors suggest that trauma may dispose individuals to further stressors, and increase the response to these stressors.
Abstract: Stressful events may have immediate effects on well-being, and by influencing appraisal processes, coping methods, life styles, parental behaviours, as well as behavioural and neuronal reactivity, may also have long lasting repercussions on physical and psychological health. In addition, through these and similar processes, traumatic experiences may have adverse intergenerational consequences. Given the lengthy and traumatic history of stressors experienced by Aboriginal peoples, it might be expected that such intergenerational effects may be particularly notable. In the present review we outline some of the behavioural disturbances associated with stressful/traumatic experiences (e.g., depression, anxiety, posttraumatic stress disorder, and substance abuse disorder), and describe the influence of several variables (age, sex, early life or other experiences, appraisals, coping strategies, as well as stressor chronicity, controllability, predictability and ambiguity) on vulnerability to pathology. Moreover, we suggest that trauma may dispose individuals to further stressors, and increase the response to these stressors. It is further argued that the shared collective experiences of trauma experienced by First Nations peoples, coupled with related collective memories, and persistent sociocultural disadvantages, have acted to increase vulnerability to the transmission and expression of intergenerational trauma effects.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The findings demonstrate that sympathetic nervous system responses to naturalistic stressors can be attenuated by self-affirmation, and were strongest among individuals most concerned about negative college evaluation, those most psychologically vulnerable.
Abstract: Objective: Everyday stressors can threaten valued aspects of the self. Self-affirmation theory posits that this threat could be attenuated if individuals affirm alternative self-resources. The present study examined whether self-affirmation would buffer cumulative stress responses to an ongoing academic stressor. Design: Undergraduate participants provided 15-hr urine samples on the morning of their most stressful examination and baseline samples 14 days prior to the examination. Participants were randomly assigned to the self-affirmation condition where they wrote two essays on important values over the 2-week period prior to exam, or a control condition. Main Outcome Measures: Samples were analyzed for urinary catecholamine excretion (epinephrine, norepinephrine), an indicator of sympathetic nervous system activation. Participants also indicated their appraisals of the examination experience. Results: Participants in the control condition increased in cumulative epinephrine levels from baseline to examination, whereas participants in the self-affirmation condition did not differ from baseline to examination. The buffering effect of self-affirmation was strongest among individuals most concerned about negative college evaluation, those most psychologically vulnerable. Conclusion: The findings demonstrate that sympathetic nervous system responses to naturalistic stressors can be attenuated by self-affirmation. Discussion centers on psychological pathways by which affirmation can reduce stress and the implications of the findings for health outcomes among chronically stressed participants.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Basic evidence is provided for the positive association between chronic stress and obesity, but the need for more research in adolescents is pointed out to further elucidate the role of chronic stress in the aetiology of obesity in this crucial life period.
Abstract: Aims This review describes the role of chronic stress in the development of obesity and available methodologies for the assessment of chronic stress in humans, in particular adolescents, with the aim of developing a feasible methodology to implement in an epidemiological study. Data synthesis Chronic stress seems to be associated with the aetiology of obesity by interacting with both mechanisms of energy intake (increase of appetite and energy intake) and expenditure (decrease of physical activity) and by stimulating visceral fat accumulation in favour of abdominal obesity. However, more research is necessary to unravel the underlying mechanisms of the obesity-inducing effects of chronic stress, especially in adolescents. In addition to experimental research, epidemiological observational studies, in particular cohort studies, are appropriate given their non-intervening character, lower budgetary costs and natural setting. In practice, stress can be assessed by means of either a subjective approach using stressor checklists or interviews, or an objective approach measuring biomarkers of stress. In epidemiological research in adolescents, a combination of both strategies is recommended, with a preference for a general stressor checklist for adolescents and measurement of salivary cortisol, one of the most used and well-characterized biomarkers of stress. Conclusion This review provides basic evidence for the positive association between chronic stress and obesity, but also points out the need for more research in adolescents to further elucidate the role of chronic stress in the aetiology of obesity in this crucial life period. Good, well-standardized epidemiological surveys could be of great benefit in this research area.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This is the first study reporting that 5-HTTLPR and stressful life events interact to predict endocrine stress reactivity in a non-clinical sample and underpin the potential moderating role of HPA-axis hyper-reactivity as a premorbid risk factor to increase the vulnerability for depression in subjects with low serotonin transporter efficiency and a history of severe life events.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A research method for assessing stress and mental health in ongoing population-based social surveys that combines self-reports of naturally occurring daily stressors with a primary marker of stress physiology, salivary cortisol is presented.
Abstract: This article presents a research method for assessing stress and mental health in ongoing population-based social surveys that combines self-reports of naturally occurring daily stressors with a pr...

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated the relationship between mental toughness, stressor appraisal, coping strategies and coping effectiveness among a sample of athletes and found that higher levels of mental toughness were associated with more problem-focused coping, but less emotion-focused and avoidance coping.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: There is a need for the establishment of student advisors and counsellors combined with a faculty advising system in addition to student-oriented programmes to address perceived sources of stress amongst dental undergraduate students at a private dental institution in India.
Abstract: Introduction: Dental students have to face the additional stress of their studies in addition to the stresses related to dentistry as a profession. Furthermore, increasing stress may result in declining student performance. The aim of the present study was to assess perceived sources of stress amongst dental undergraduate students at a private dental institution in India. Materials and methods: A modified dental environment stress (DES) questionnaire which consisted of 38 questions was used to assess the levels of stress. Results: The first major stressor for all the students was examination and grades with a mean score of 2.86 (SD 1.06) followed by full working day, receiving criticism from supervisors about academic or clinical work, amount of cheating in dental faculty, rules and regulations of the faculty and fear of unemployment after graduation. Amongst the six highest stressors in each year, at least three were dental faculty related. There was a significant difference in stress perception between genders with a predilection for males. Twelve of the 38 questionnaire items had significant differences across the year groups including clinical DES items. Conclusion: The primary sources of stress as perceived by nearly 275 students at one private dental school in India were examinations and grades followed by full working day and receiving criticism from supervisors about academic or clinical work. It appears there is a need for the establishment of student advisors and counsellors combined with a faculty advising system in addition to student-oriented programmes.

01 Jan 2009
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated the relationship between mental toughness, stressor appraisal, coping strategies and coping effectiveness among a sample of athletes and found that higher levels of mental toughness were associated with more problem-focused coping, but less emotion-focused and avoidance coping.
Abstract: The aim of the present study was to investigate the relationship between mental toughness, stressor appraisal, coping strategies and coping effectiveness among a sample of athletes. Participants were 482 athletes (male n = 305; female n = 177), aged between 16 and 45 years (M age = 20.44 years, SD = 3.98). In support of a priori predictions, mental toughness was associated with stress intensity and control appraisal, but not the type of stressor experienced by athletes. Total mental toughness and its six components predicted coping and coping effectiveness in relation to the self-selected stressor. In particular, higher levels of mental toughness were associated with more problem-focused coping, but less emotion-focused and avoidance coping. Coping effectiveness was influenced by the coping strategy employed by the athletes.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The cognitive appraisal of stigma-related stress, emotional stress reactions and coping responses may add to the understanding of how stigma affects people with mental illness.

Journal ArticleDOI
01 Apr 2009-Appetite
TL;DR: High-restraint women ate more high-fat food than did low-Restraint women, regardless of stress level, and social influence effects of small-group testing may have increased the ego-threat of the stressor or disinhibited high-rest restraint women in both stress groups.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The results support and specify the role of emotional reactions to stressors on the pathway from vulnerability to psychosis and highlight the relevance of anxiety.
Abstract: Background Vulnerability-stress models ascribe stress a pivotal role in the development of psychosis. However, moderating and mediating mechanisms translating stress into psychosis and the specificity of the association are not clearly established. It is hypothesized that stress will trigger paranoid ideation in vulnerable individuals through an increase in negative emotion. Method Using a repeated-measures design, 64 healthy participants with varying levels of vulnerability [psychosis symptoms assessed by the Community Assessment of Psychic Experiences (CAPE)] were assigned to a stress and a non-stress condition in random order. Stress was induced by exposing participants to building-site noise (75 dB) applied concurrently with difficult knowledge questions. Symptoms of paranoia, depression and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) were assessed by state-adapted versions of clinical scales. Results In the stress condition there was an increase in paranoia, depression and negative emotion. Multilevel linear modeling (MLM) revealed the increase in paranoia under stress to be moderated by the level of vulnerability and mediated by anxiety. Although participants generally showed an increase in anxiety under stress, anxiety was more strongly related to paranoia in participants with higher baseline symptomatology. Conclusions The results support and specify the role of emotional reactions to stressors on the pathway from vulnerability to psychosis and highlight the relevance of anxiety.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this article, the authors tested the hypothesis that the level of perceived public stigma and personal factors such as rejection sensitivity, perceived legitimacy of discrimination and ingroup perceptions (group value; group identification; entitativity, or the perception of the ingroup of people with mental illness as a coherent unit) predict the cognitive appraisal of stigma as a stressor.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The Neonatal Infant Stressor Scale is developed to help track, measure and manage presumed accumulated stress in preterm neonates.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Establishing the existence and extent of work stress in nurses in a hospital setting, identifying the major sources of stress, and finding the incidence of psychosomatic illness related to stress are established.
Abstract: Stress in nurses is an endemic problem. It contributes to health problems in nurses and decreases their efficiency. Documenting the causes and extent of stress in any healthcare unit is essential for successful interventions . Aim : Establishing the existence and extent of work stress in nurses in a hospital setting, identifying the major sources of stress, and finding the incidence of psychosomatic illness related to stress. Materials and Methods: This study used a questionnaire relating to stressors and a list of psychosomatic ailments. One hundred and six nurses responded and they were all included in the study. Stressors were based on four main factors: work related, work interactions, job satisfaction, and home stress. The factors relating to stress were given weights according to the severity. The total score of 50 was divided into mild, moderate, severe, and burnout. Results: Most important causes of stress were jobs not finishing in time because of shortage of staff, conflict with patient relatives, overtime, and insufficient pay. Psychosomatic disorders like acidity, back pain, stiffness in neck and shoulders, forgetfulness, anger, and worry significantly increased in nurses having higher stress scores. Increase in age or seniority did not significantly decrease stress. Conclusion: Moderate levels of stress are seen in a majority of the nurses. Incidence of psychosomatic illness increases with the level of stress. Healthcare organizations need to urgently take preemptive steps to counter this problem.

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined the association between openness to experience and stress regulation (i.e., stress exposure, reactivity, recovery, and restoration) in young adults undergoing a laboratory stressor, and physiological and affective reactivity and recovery were examined.