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