Biopsychosocial Framework

The events or situations that can produce stress are called stressors. To measure the amount of stress a single event can cause two men named Thomas Holmes and Richard Rahe came up wit this idea of the Social Readjustment Rating Scale. This scale “includes 43 life events” each event comes with a point value for the amount of stress that each event should given. However more than “150 life change units within a year had an increased rate of physical or psychological illness”. Over time this scale has been modified to accommodated for gender, age, martial status, and individual characteristics. Even with the modifications made, the way each person copes with stress is quite different therefore this scale does not apply to the majority of people. Likewise this scale did help research to find that “negative life events have a more adverse effect on health than a positive event.”. Therefore traumatic events “ are events or situations that are negative; serve, and far beyond our normal expectation for everyday life or life events.” These negative events can cause extreme stress on a person which can lead to health issues. For instance PTSD or post traumatic stress disorder can cause anxiety, nervousness, sleep disturbances, and irritability. To help to resolve the health issues that come with stress many try to develop resilience. Though contrary to popular belief the

Society defines stress as anything which forces us to change. Through technical terms stress is defined as “a negative emotional state occurring in response to events that are perceived as taking or exceeding a person’s resources or ability to cope.” To explaining stress researchers came up with the “Cognitive appraisal model”, this system works to tell us whether we believe we have enough resources to deal with the situation without becoming stressed. For instance as a now college student those who have had previous experience taking finales in high school can have less stress than those who have not taken it. This is because they have previous experience with taking the tests and learning how to study while those who have never taken one can become extremely stressed over the unknown of the test. Stress is one of the sub branches that is attached to the world of health psychology. Health psychology is a quickly growing branch that deals with the way the mind and body work together. Psychologists that work in the health field came up with the biopsychosocial model. This model explains the complex interaction with biological, psychological, and social factors.

All of this stress has a significant impact on one’s overall health and wellness. From cancer to child mortality, nearly every

Cavanaugh & Blanchard (2005) point out there are two important age related differences in the stress and coping paradigm. People across the ages experience stress in different areas. Young adults experience stress in the area of finance, work, family and personal life than older adults. The stress experienced by older adults is age related than role related .For example environmental stress may be caused by immobility rather than a specific role. As people get older they become better at managing their lives to avoid stress.

Humans frequently turn on the stress response that was intended to assist our survival in reaction to the everyday challenges we face. Professor Michael Marmot conducted a study in England of 28,000 people’s health over a course of 40 years. Each person was a British

Stress is a subjective response involving interactions between an individual and the environment that is appraised by the individual as being detrimental to their mental and physical wellbeing (Selye, 2013). A combination of genetics, life stressors and ongoing stress can increase vulnerability to psychiatric disorders such as depression, post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety (Haddadi & Besharat, 2010), alongside physiological disorders such as cardiovascular disease (Seery, 2011). However, the response to stress can be mediated by overcoming the adverse effects of risk exposure, avoiding negative trajectories and learning to cope successfully with traumatic experiences. This process of adapting to the environment following a stressful

The American Psychological Association 2009 defines biopsychosocial as “the systematic integration of the biological, psychological and social approaches of the study of mental health and specific mental disorders” (p.48). Santrock, John W (2015) refers the human lifespan as the primary base of the human growth process that starts with the reproduction of cells. The reproduction will include the physical development of the body, brain development and internal organs that are developing during the pregnancy, birth, early, middle, and late childhood, adolescence, early, middle, and late adulthood until they die. In addition to the environments where individuals grow, culture and socioeconomic status also influence the person’s personalities. There exist six main theories of human development and these are: the Psychoanalytic theories, cognitive theories, behavioral and social cognitive theories, ethological theories, ecological theories, and eclectic theoretical orientation (Santrock, 2015).

Chapters four and five covered stress-related disorders and anxiety disorders and other disorders as well. I have learned a lot of valuable information about stress and how it impacts a person. Stress can come from many different events such as work, school, friends, and even from finances. Stress can also be a good or bad depending on how the person may view the situation. I have learned that stress can impact the body such as the endocrine system and the immune system. We become sick when we are dealing with severe stress like a final exam in college. Furthermore, the longer we deal with our stress the more it impacts our bodies. Dealing with stress over a long period of time may weaken the body’s immune system.

Chronic stress puts your health at risk. (2016, April 21). Retrieved August 11, 2017, from

The physiological abilities change with increasing age, older adults often have few physical resources to deal with stressful situation .The situation that was appraised as less stressful in middle aged may be appraised as stressful later in life

Psychological and physical well-being and the overall quality of life are under a constant threat of stress and thus, psychological and medical sciences have long been concerned with studying stress response. Cox (1979) claimed that because of the poor understanding and defining it, the concept of stress tends to be rather elusive. The term, “stress”, commonly describes any physchological or physical alteration that deranges the organism’s homeostasis (or balance). This essay reviews some of the biological factors involved in stress and it has been organized in the following way. The paper begins by briefly introducing the concept of stress. It will then go on to discus and describe the automatic response (fight or flight reaction),

Changes in vitality with aging decreases the ability to handle stress. The combined stressors from declining health, financial problems, feelings of loss, or becoming a burden can take its toll on older adults. It has been said that “stress breeds sickness” and we find this to be an accurate statement. Reports show that self-perception and self-feelings are connected to health status. Furthermore,

The class findings on stress showed consistencies and inconsistencies with scholarly research. The class findings on age showed older adults reported a lower amount of stress than either early and middle-aged adults. These findings are consistent with scholar research that as individuals age, the amount of stress decreases. In terms of age differences in stress, the class found that were no gender differences in the amount of stress, symptoms of stress or sleep problems. These findings are somewhat inconsistent with scholarly researcher. Scholarly research has found that women do experience more stress than men do. In terms of difference in coping in mechanism, the class found that women reported more use of emotional support, eating, and asking

Stress is one of the number one causes that contribute to people’s health problems. According to Weber.edu, “in Healthy People 2000, a report from the U.S.

Exogenous threats can shape stress responses across the lifespan, and influences the rate of aging (ES-2014-aging). Environmental stressors include any factors that cause cell injury, such as heavy metals, radiation, heat exposure, reactive oxygen species, osmotic fluctuation, as well as social and psychological stressors (ES-2014). These trigger the stress response and related behavioral pathways through neural networks and interconnected neurohormonal and immune patterns. The capacity of human beings to learn about, imagine, remember, and anticipate stressful situations and their warning signs can create chronic states of vigilant arousal in the body. Besides, there are multiple individual differences that make some people more vulnerable to stress, where the identical stimuli cause exaggerated stress responses (ES-2014).