The Ever-changing Perception of Stress
“Oh my, I have so much to do and it’s causing so much stress!”, I yell to my friends at the lunch table. As though my friends were a chorus group, they groan and moan in a reflection of their own stresses. One of them proceeds to list his stresses, “I know right? I have 4 tests this week, Spanish on Tuesday, then AP Bio, AP Calc, and AP US all on Friday! And, a recital this weekend, and SA — ” The reason why I didn’t complete his sentence was due to the mere reason that I couldn’t. Although I enjoy his company, mid-sentence into his list, I had already silenced his voice. I just couldn’t take it anymore. Without any regard to what he said, I replied graciously, “C’mon! It’ll be alright, don’t stress it!” He sighed in acceptance of his bleak plight, and our conversations wandered away from the topic of school shortly after.
Stress is staple of the high school experience for all students, whether it be through the medium of academics, sports, family, or social life. Although many old-timers claim the level of stress in today’s population is consistent with the past, recent data has proved this to be false. A study conducted by Carnegie Mellon University discovered that stress levels have increased by up to 30% in the past 26 years. The study identified that women, and low-income citizens are more stressed, but more importantly, that the younger population is facing the greatest increase in stress. This increase of stress in millennials, has been a peculiar phenomenon. Mike Hais, a market researcher and co-author of Millennial Momentum suggests that, “They[millennials] were sheltered in many ways… with high expectations for what they should achieve”. But shouldn’t this encourage them to succeed? This isn’t the case, according to many psychologists. Most depicted a fixed mindset in millennials during their young adulthood. An entitlement to the self was garnered through a belief of “specialness” which was instilled in them. This only deepened the hole that millennials were about to plunge into. Without altering beliefs, the growth mindset was never allowed in the millennial mind, as seen in a University of New Hampshire study which stated that millennials scored 25% higher in entitlement related issues than their 40–60 year old counterparts. In addition to the preexisting setback, recent economic depressions have compounded the psychological toll of stress.
To dissect this societal-wide increase in stress, we must go back to the roots of the problem in the human mind and body. 50 years ago, in 1965, an experiment conducted by Martin Seligman tested the hypothesis that dogs react to bells in the same way as if they were shocked. He placed dogs in a closed crate which had the ability to be electrified and shocked the dogs whenever he rang the bell. Soon after a few rounds of this, the dogs began to react to the bell as though they had been shocked. However, the real shocker in the experiment was when he placed the dogs in open crates, allowing the dogs to escape the shocks. In those crates, whenever he shocked the dogs, they wouldn’t attempt to jump out of the crate, rather just whimpered. Seligman experimented with dogs which had never been shocked with the open crate and they leaped to safety as expected. But why didn’t the first dogs leap out as the second group did? Unfortunately, the dogs had learnt psychological defeat, a phenomenon later identified as “learned helplessness”. Learned helplessness is the scar of a repeated traumatic event, in which someone feels a sense of defeat and powerlessness.
But we don’t have the feeble mind of a dog, do we?
It is definitely true that humans aren’t as simple minded as the animals utilized in the experiments, but a deeper understanding of the underlying biological response to perception was acquired. Like the dogs, we as humans, have the same tendencies to perceive stress as a negative and lose self-efficacy if it continues to have a negative impact on our lives. Overtime, a collective realization that our lives is dictated by stress, creeps upon us, and demoralizes us. This is why my friends and I can’t get over stress, and frown on our every meeting with it. Spreading like a disease, it has established a negative stigma.
“People are disturbed not by a thing, but by their perception of a thing.” — Epictetus
I’m not here to claim that stress isn’t a problem, it very much is, although I suggest that we examine the effects of our perception of it. Similar to the way someone’s wealth may change others’ attitude towards that person, the effects of stress can be manipulated. Once again, to test the theory, a psychological experiment was conducted by Health Psychology. Over the past decade, participants were indirectly (through questions that identified stress-related symptoms) asked about the effects of their stress levels. In addition to the survey, a record of premature deaths was kept of all participants. After considering and calibrating for the irregularities in their data, they concluded that “individuals who perceived that stress affects their health and reported a large amount of stress had an increased risk of premature death by 43%”. The most surprising data of their results was that people who had the perception that stress had no effects on health, were four to five times less likely to be in a poor health condition or psychological distress.
But, how can a perception change so much about people?
Once again to test the newfound conclusion, the social stress test was later conducted based upon Health Psychology’s initial study. In a smaller, and controlled setting, people were treated differently while being asked to carry out certain tasks under a time limit. Stress inducing remarks such as, “Do it faster!”, and “You can’t do this!”, were told to one group of individuals (Group 1) while another group received positive encouragement as they completed the task (Group 2). As expected, this had a negative effect on peoples’ mental and physical states. Most participants of the former group had higher heart rates, narrowing blood vessels, and mental distress, all symptoms of increased stress. However, in the next round of experimenting, the participants of group 1 were told to rethink their stress response as helpful. Phrases such as “the pounding heart is preparing you for action and getting more oxygen to your brain”, were used to teach participants that stress was helpful for their performance. The results of the second round concluded that they were less stressed and anxious but more confident. However, their physical response to the change in perspective was the most astounding of all.
In a normal stress response, the heart rate of an individual increases, and blood vessels constrict, to increase the blood flow and pressure in the body. In the case of group 1, their heart rates were high, but their blood vessels didn’t constrict, a physical state very similar to when people are courageous. This small but significant biological change can be the difference between death by a stress-induced heart attack at age 50 and living well into the 90’s. In addition to the relaxation of blood vessels, oxytocin levels increased in the individuals. Although seen as a cuddly hormone, oxytocin at its essence is a stress induced neuro-hormone. Whenever stressed, oxytocin forces people to make social connections, and reach out to others for help. In essence, it is the body nudging us to share our misfortune, rather than bottling it up.
Now I wouldn’t necessarily ask for more stressful situations in my life, but the recently discovered science has given me a different outlook on stress. Our perception of situations of stress must change and we must understand that the harmful effects of stress on our health are not inevitable. When we choose to view stress responses as helpful, we are creating the biology of courage, with increased heart rates, but relaxed blood vessels. When we choose to view stress responses as helpful, we open ourselves to others, breaking down the walls set between ourselves. Stress gives us access to our hearts, one that finds joy and meaning in connecting with others and gives us energy and strength to handle stress better. But most importantly, we are not just handling stress better, we are believing in ourselves to handle life’s challenges.
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