Stress Harms Ability to Fight Stress

[David Baxter PhD]

Stress Harms Ability to Fight Stress
Tue Aug 3, 2004

TUESDAY, Aug. 3 (HealthDayNews) -- Stress may boost levels of certain hormones that influence your ability to cope with the negative effects of stress, says a study in the August issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry.

The study was conducted by researchers at the National Center for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder at the Veterans Affairs New England Healthcare System in West Haven, Conn. They measured levels of the hormones DHEA-S and cortisol in 25 military personnel before and after they experienced stressful scenarios in military survival school.

"The DHEA-S-cortisol ratios during stress were significantly higher in subjects who reported fewer symptoms of dissociation and exhibited superior military performance," the researchers wrote.

"These data provide prospective, empirical evidence that the DHEA-S level is increased by acute stress in healthy humans and that the DHEA-S-cortisol ratio may index [indicate] the degree to which an individual is buffered against the negative effects of stress," they wrote.

 

[thebehaviourist]

I wonder if the level of stress that people may experience may be due to how they were allowed to behave and encouraged to behave when they were going through their "informative years"?

A recent book by an English Psychiatrist states that, "A recent study compared Australian teenage students going away for the first time on an exchange scheme,with those that stayed at home.
The researchers found that although the students felt stress this was limited because these were supportive and controlled cicumstances".

It would seem to me that those who have had a supportive and controlled environment during any stressful situations learnt better ways of handling stress. So if parents want their children to be better equipped in handling life then they need to teach their children succesful task accomplishment methods, and if the parents have a problem with doing that then i would suggest that they learn first!

I think that this, and topics like this, touch on the controversial subject of "Nature V's Nurture". I myself believe in the possibility of a balance of the two, and the keyword here is balance. To seek a balance you must be willing to adapt and change, i wonder if some people find that difficult and therefore try and stay static. That alone may mean that they put themselves under more stress than if they attempted change in the first place?

 

[David Baxter PhD]

I wonder if the level of stress that people may experience may be due to how they were allowed to behave and encouraged to behave when they were going through their "informative years"?

The level of stress experienced may not be what you mean here -- but your comments could well apply to how the individual processes (and interprets) that stress -- several factors come to mind here, including internal/external locus of control, etc., ("nurture"), as well as the biological ("nature") factors like physiological reactivity to the stressful situations or stimuli. Your other point about people sometimes feeling stress at the prospect of change is also a good one -- the reality is that nothing and noone is truly static but people often act and react as if they were.